Hayley Vaughan

Hayley Vaughan is a fictional character from the American ABC soap opera, All My Children. She was portrayed by actress Kelly Ripa from November 22, 1990, to December 18, 2002. Ripa returned to the role briefly for two episodes in January 2010 for the series' 40th anniversary.

After Ripa introduced the role of Hayley Vaughan to viewers, she quickly became one of the most popular characters on the soap opera. On April 14, 2011, after the impending cancellation of All My Children, Live with Regis and Kelly honored the character of Hayley with a special video montage, as Ripa felt saddened by the loss of the series.

Hayley arrived in Pine Valley on Thanksgiving Day 1990 with her hair dyed jet black in an Elvira hairdo with makeup to match (she was Pine Valley's answer to punk rock). She crashed Trevor and Natalie's party and announced that she was staying with them. Her mother Arlene soon followed and it was revealed that Hayley had spent a miserable childhood playing caretaker to her alcoholic mother. When Arlene crashed into Jack's car causing a pregnant Brooke to go into premature labor, Arlene pleaded with Hayley to lie and say she was driving to keep Arlene from going to jail for a drunk driving charge. Hayley complied. Hayley's then-boyfriend, Brian Bodine, knew the truth and convinced Hayley to come clean. Arlene, unable to let her daughter take the blame for her crime, confessed and went to jail for her role in the scheme. Hayley and Brian got engaged, but her ever-controlling father, Adam, saw to it that this relationship came to an abrupt end.

Hayley turned to alcohol and Will Cortlandt for comfort. Having been disinherited by his Uncle Palmer, Will convinced a drunken Hayley to elope with him. When Will tried to force himself upon his virgin wife, Hayley couldn't bring herself to sleep with Will. Hayley slowly turned against nearly everyone who loved her, due to Will's manipulations and staunchly defended him when Gloria Marsh accused him of rape. Will was later found murdered after Hayley, in a drunken epiphany, finally realized the truth about him. Janet Green was later revealed as the murderer. After her relationship with Brian ended, Hayley was free to fall in love with Charlie Brent. They opened Pine Valley Investigations and had a wonderful relationship until Adam, once again stepped in and broke up this relationship. Adam turned over the CEO position of Enchantment to Hayley as a consolation prize in order to control her.

At Enchantment Hayley met Alec McIntyre, another con artist like Will Cortlandt. When her mother was released from jail, she pressured Hayley into marrying Alec. Hayley married him, despite her attraction to Mateo Santos, the younger brother of Dr. Maria Santos. Mateo tried to convince Hayley of Alec's demonic behavior. Hayley was finally convinced when she and Mateo walked into her mother's room and found Alec trying to pour alcohol down Arlene's throat in order to silence her threats of telling Hayley about their sordid affair. Hayley sent Alec McIntyre to jail for trying to kill her mother via alcohol poisoning. Trevor told Arlene that it would be best if she left town for a while in a rehabilitation program, Arlene took his advice. Mateo and Hayley finally declared their love for each other and were engaged. Hayley and Mateo started living together in a small apartment. Mateo came upon a terrific idea of buying "Hal's Bar" and start a restaurant/cafe shop with Hayley. After many attempts to buy the bar, they finally were permitted to buy the bar and they turned it into a restaurant called "Holidays" and business started rolling in.

Mateo and Haley's relationship was tested by one of Mateo's old friends, Tanner Jordan. Tanner arrived in Pine Valley from Texas and immediately accepted a job as a waiter at Holidays. Tanner desired Hayley from the first day he saw her. Determined to win her over, he tried everything in his power to break up Mateo and Hayley – including paying an actor to impersonate his alcoholic father. Tanner was an airplane pilot and used Hayley's interest in learning to fly as a means of getting closer to her. He convinced Hayley to fly with him under the guise of surprising Mateo while he was in Texas, but instead he faked a forced emergency landing near a cave in Virginia where he drugged and raped her. All hopes of finding Hayley seemed lost, but Mateo managed to find the cave. As he struggled with Tanner, Tanner was accidentally mortally wounded by a gunshot. Mateo found Hayley and had her rushed to a nearby hospital. Mateo stayed by her side and asked her to marry him – right there, right now. Hayley said yes and she and Mateo (with Adam and Liza there as witnesses) were married in her hospital room.

Life seemed to return to normal for Hayley and her husband. When Erica visited Enchantment and saw how poorly it was being run by the management team Hayley had installed, she made an offer to buy back the cosmetics company. Hayley was more than willing to sell Enchantment back to Erica.

Life was blissful for Hayley and Mateo until tragedy entered their lives once more in the form of Jim Thompson. Jim, a surviving passenger on the airplane flight that took Maria Santos Grey's life, created a phony relationship with Brooke English in hopes of hiding the fact that he was responsible for the plane's destruction. Brooke, suspicion of Jim's actions, asked Hayley and Mateo to do some sleuthing into Jim's past. Hayley and Mateo discovered some of Jim's shady secrets, putting their lives in jeopardy. Jim learned of Hayley and Mateo's investigation and rigged the furnace of their apartment building to expel carbon monoxide gas into their apartment. Hayley and Mateo survived, but Mateo remained in a coma for weeks.