Melissa McBride remembers her first day on set of The Walking Dead 

is just around the corner — Oct. 22, to be exact. As we look ahead to that landmark episode (which also happens to be the show’s season 8 premiere), we asked Melissa McBride to look

As one of the five original cast members whose characters are still alive and kicking, McBride had to go all the way back to season 1 to recall her first day. “I felt like a stranger in a strange land,” she says. “I had a lot of anxiety that I was trying really hard to just sort of temper because there were people who had already been there, and just that tightness, that camaraderie developed very quickly.”

Of course, Carol wasn’t the show centerpiece that she is today, as the character was more of a background player when it all began. “I didn’t have much of anything to say on the first day,” McBride recalls. “I was just really observant and apprehensive. Just a little anxiety because I felt I was being thrust into somebody else’s world and I wasn’t quite sure what it was. And I enjoyed the day thoroughly, I do remember that very well. And I was excited to see the actors that were going to be working on the show — just observing a whole lot and not knowing anything about where this character was going. Didn’t know the backstory too much. I didn’t know much of anything.”

My, how times have changed since then for both the actress and the character. To see McBride wax nostalgic about her first day on set, check out the video above. And for more

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