Starstruck!

I'm not gonna lie, I was just as excited to see Conan O'Brien as I was to see my own family members. I've been a fan since his early days on the Late Night show. As soon as the LA trip was planned, I asked if we could try for some Tonight Show tickets. When we learned Heather's email won the lottery, we screamed. Another freak-out came when we learned that Anna's boss, knowing Conan's agent, upgraded our tickets to VIP!

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Being VIP meant we did not have to get to Universal in the morning to get in the first-come/ first-serve line. We could arrive minutes before the doors opened and know our parking and seats were not only secure, but AWESOME! We were excited and did arrive about an hour early. After passing through the gate and taking our free parking spot, we were met by an NBC page. He told us to enjoy a VIP waiting area with food and drinks while we waited to be escorted in. We chose to instead take a peek around the backlot and speculate about what was all filming on the stages. We saw trailers for CSI and golf carts for Desperate Housewives, a tram tour went right by us and lots of production guys were busy with work.

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Once in the VIP line, we were offered water and juice and told that we'd be escorted in after the first 90 people (assured that they'd fill up the first 3 rows which were not the best seats since they were blocked with camera equipment). We waited and giggled about how long the general admission line was and how important we felt. We saw the night's guests, Kristen Stewart, Judd Apatow and Carrie Underwood, drive right by us in their limos.

We were also warned that taking pictures once we were inside the studio was totally forbidden. These are the only pictures we got of this experience. Above is the outside of The Tonight Show studio. Below is us with our Conan armbands.

Being a VIP was soooo cool, but the experience of the show was even better! We did have great seats, 3rd row behind Andy Richter. You can't ever see us, but we're sure you can hear us! There were a few things that surprised me about attending this taping. One was that the studio was really small. Our high school auditorium is actually bigger. The stage is much more compact than it appears on TV. Another thing that surprised me was how effectively they pumped us up. A comedian came out for 15 minutes and warmed up the audience and the band actually circulated the studio playing high-energy music in the aisles. Things I would never laugh at while watching the show on TV were hilarious during the taping! We went home hoarse and with tingling hands from screaming and clapping so hard. I was also surprised by how little is edited out. The show is filmed start to finish with no stopping or second-takes. One joke with Kristen Stewart is all that we saw that folks at home did not. There were a few treats just for us in the audience, though. We heard Conan film promos for the night's show and sing us "The End of the Show Song." It was so weird and so awesome to see the set and the people I watch regularly on TV in real life. Since they kind of came up and interacted with the audience, we were close enough to touch Conan, Andy, LaBamba and other members of the band. I could go on and on, but I'll just conclude the description of this experience by saying it was first-class and one-of-a-lifetime. I still smile thinking about it!