General Hospital isn’t short on talent, having pretty much dominated the list of this year’s Daytime Emmy Awards nominees. And one of the ABC soap’s rising young stars, Katelyn MacMullen (Willow Tait), says she has that pool of incredibly gifted performers to thank for her own nomination in the Outstanding Young Performer category. She spoke with Soap Central about her nomination — the second one she’s received since joining the show in 2018 — and shared all the details about how some of GH’s most legendary cast members helped her deliver the wow-worthy scenes that had everyone talking last year.

Soap Central: Congratulations on your Emmy nomination! How does it feel the second time around?

Katelyn MacMullen: Thank you so much! Oh, my gosh, it’s so exciting! Not that it wasn’t exciting last year, because it was super exciting, but I didn’t know I could feel this excited all over again. [Laughs] I’m very good friends with Tahj [Bellow, T.J. Ashford] and other people in my category, so we’ve gotten to message each other and take time to celebrate, which has been really fun.

Soap Central: General Hospital dominated this year! Has there been a celebratory feeling on set since the nominations were announced?

MacMullen: We actually haven’t been back to set yet — we’ve been on a two-week hiatus — but definitely on social media, we’ve felt it! We’ve said to each other, “Dang, GH really did have a lot of nominations this year!” It’s been really exciting.

Soap Central: How did you find out that you’d been nominated?

MacMullen: My mom came into town kind of randomly over the hiatus, and I was in the kitchen with my boyfriend, trying to make tea, while she was online doing something. I had forgotten that day was the day they were going to release the list of nominees. I mean, we had just found out a couple of days sooner that they had set the date! So, she was like, “Did you know that this was going to come out?” And I was like, “No!” And then she blurted out, “You’re nominated.” And I was like, “What?!” And she said, “Wait, let me double-check that,” because she thought she got it wrong. [Laughs]

Soap Central: I’m so glad she didn’t! Can you imagine? “You’ve been nominated! Oh, wait, just kidding.”

MacMullen: Oh, I know! [Laughs] But I was so excited — I hugged my boyfriend and was like, “Oh, my gosh, I have to call everyone!”

Soap Central: Who did you call?

MacMullen: I think my agent and my manager texted me, so we ended up on the phone, and then I talked to Tahj, Briana Lane [Brook Lynn Ashton], Briana Henry [Jordan Ashford], so many people! I also talked to Kim Delaney [Jackie Templeton] — she called me, and that was exciting. I was geeking out.

Click here to read the full Soap Central interview.