Remember When: The Bold and the Beautiful's 38th anniversary (Part Three: 1997-2001)

The Bold and the Beautiful said, "Top of the Morgan to ya!"

March 23 marked 38 years of The Bold and the Beautiful – and what a ride it's been, with Forresters, Logans, and Spencers galore, plus now the Finnegans and the Nozawas. As the soap reached a decade on the air, it showed no signs of slowing down as Brooke stepped up her pursuit of the married Ridge (she even used Y&R's Victor Newman to get under Ridge's skin!), Taylor nearly died giving birth to twins, and Stephanie and Eric's reunion was shuttered by a naughty picture in a Bible. Plus, B&B's legacy children came into their own, with aged-to-teens Rick, Bridget, and C.J. all taking center stage in major story. With everything on the still-new Internet! Relive changing year starters from 1 to 2 and join us for this phase of the show that had to compete with a new genre: “reality” TV! (And look where that got us.)

1997: He had good aim, I'll Grant you

Being a teenager is rough for any kid, but young Rick Forrester found the jump to adolescence especially hard. First, he was SORASed out of childhood in 1995, then he had to watch his mother's on-again-off-again marry-go-rounds with half-brother/stepfather Ridge. By the time Brooke wed Grant Chambers to make Ridge jealous, Rick had bypassed moody and ventured into darkness. Grant took a ton of heat for throwing his weight around as Forrester Creations' CEO, and one night he took a bullet – with suspects abounding. Eventually, Ridge went to jail for the crime, though the twist was that Grant had framed Ridge to protect Rick, who had actually pulled the trigger but blocked it out. After Ridge was told and agreed to keep Rick's secret, Grant pleaded with the court for leniency, and Ridge's sentence was reduced. By 2007, Rick finally learned what he'd done but never believed it. Is it any wonder Rick shot at Ridge and Caroline in 2015?

1998: Doubting Thomas

Taylor and Ridge had struggled to have a child, but when Taylor finally became pregnant, it was on the heels of Ridge cooling it in jail for shooting Grant. Lovesick Thorne convinced Taylor to say the child was his and did everything he could to keep Taylor's mind off Ridge, including dosing her when she was prescribed bedrest for her troubled pregnancy. Meanwhile, Brooke found out Thorne hadn't fathered Taylor's baby and, still having a thing for Ridge, threw her chapeau into the ring to keep Ridge unaware. After Taylor delivered baby Thomas in Thorne's car, Taylor defied Thorne and told Ridge the truth, which led to Tridge reuniting. Talk about dubious circumstances under which to be born! It probably didn't help future psycho Thomas that Sheila, who by this time had gone nuts again, clipped a lock of his hair when he was a baby as a coercion tool.

1999: A choker would look really nice with that

Stephanie had long decried Brooke's assimilation of her husband and son to anyone who would listen (always forgetting to mention that it had been Eric who pursued Brooke, and while he was in the process of divorcing Stephanie at that), but when The Queen got wise to the fact that Thorne had developed his own interest in the ultimate thorn in her side, something in Stephanie snapped. Having learned that Thorne and Brooke had planned a romantic rendezvous up at the family's Big Bear cabin, Stephanie got there before Thorne and harshed Brooke's mellow. Soaked from rain, Stephanie seethed at her nemesis, calling Brooke a cancer that needed to be cut out. But instead of relying on bullying or simple slapping as usual, Stephanie went a step further and gave Brooke a necklace of fingers. Thorne showed up just in time to keep his mom from asphyxiating his lover, but this was the catalyst that began Stephanie's transformation from smother mother to Gangsta Granny. Her own abuse at the hands of her father, revealed several years later, certainly explained La Forrester's behavior.

2000: Fast tracking the “'til death do us part” part

As Y2K arrived, the show had begun to focus on its first generation of children, all of whom had been “growed up” to function as story-appropriate barely legals. This was the case for Sally Spectra's son, C.J. Garrison, who had fallen in love with Amber's cousin, Becky Moore. Not for nothin', Amber had just been exposed for trying to pass Becky's child off as her own after miscarrying Rick's baby. A fateful phone call for Becky, who hadn't been feeling well, revealed to Amber that her cuz had terminal cancer. Trying to rehabilitate, Amber kept the diagnosis to herself, wanting Becky to enjoy her happiness with C.J. In a flip on Caroline being the only one who knew she was dying in 1990, Becky was kept in the dark as, one by one, her tribe learned that she wasn't long for this world. C.J. got Becky down the aisle, but moments after they said their vows, Becky collapsed and died soon after. It was devastating for Amber, C.J., and “Little Eric”, who had already lost Amber as a “mother”, plus a real tearjerker for the audience.

2001: Reach out and touch someone

Rick had been trying to put things back together with Amber, except, after Becky's death, Amber had gotten together with C.J. To create a rift between them, Rick brought “Little Eric”'s biological father, Deacon Sharpe, to town, but couldn't have predicted the dust storm Deacon would kick up. After starting a bidding war with the Forresters and Spectras over his baby, Deacon pursued Amber himself – Amber didn't want him, so he worked his considerable masculine charms on the untouched, impressionable Bridget to get Amber's attention...and to piss off the Forresters, who were standing the way of Deacon reclaiming his child. Deacon married Bridget in Vegas, and, to make the horrification of Bridget's family complete, Deacon called them and left the phone off the hook so they could hear Deacon taking Bridget's virginity. If you've ever wondered how it came to be that the Forresters hate Sheila's husband, now you know.

You've just Remembered When with the Nokia phone and iPod era of The Bold and the Beautiful! Tomorrow, we'll take the show further into the new millennium by revisiting the years 2002 through 2006. Come back for it, even if you have to pop in your AOL CD-ROM to do it!

Watch The Bold and the Beautiful weekdays on CBS or stream the show on Paramount Plus.