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To this day, former child actress Danica McKellar<\/strong> is best known for her role on the ABC coming-of-age series The Wonder Years<\/em>, in which she played love interest to Fred Savage<\/strong>\u2018s Kevin Arnold. But when you\u2019re that age, fame can be a blessing and a curse, as the 50-year-old recently revealed.<\/p>\n McKellar made an appearance on the September 23 episode<\/a> of the \u201cHey Dude\u2026 The 90s Called!<\/a>\u201d podcast hosted by Christine Taylor<\/strong> and David Lascher<\/strong>, who both starred on the Nickelodeon live action comedy of the same name. When asked about her career pivot, McKellar later earned a mathematics degree from UCLA and has written several math books geared towards middle-school and high-school girls, she had a refreshing take on her TV fame.<\/p>\n \u201cFor me, I needed to figure out who else I was besides Winnie Cooper,\u201d she said, adding that \u201cevery day, all day long,\u201d people were asking her about the character.<\/p>\n \u201cBut it was very limiting as a teenager, when you\u2019re 18, the show ended when I was 18, and you\u2019re like, OK, so now I\u2019m going to figure out like, time for the next phase of my life,\u201d she continued. \u201cAnd everywhere I went it was like, \u2018Hey aren\u2019t you that girl who played Winnie? Aren\u2019t you that girl from TV? It\u2019s like, constantly, you\u2019re trying to figure out who you are as a teenager and everyone else is telling you who you are, and it\u2019s like a thing that doesn\u2019t exist anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou guys are aware there\u2019s all the insecurity that comes from having a lot of success early on, and then you don\u2019t have that thing anymore,\u201d she continued, addressing Taylor and Lascher. \u201cAnd you\u2019re like, \u2018Who am I now? Where do I get my validation?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n McKellar compared her situation to a friend in high school who had long, \u201cgorgeous\u201d natural red hair. She said that the friend received compliments about her hair literally every single day. So finally, she cut it off and dyed it back, because she needed to figure out who she was apart from her hair.<\/p>\n \u201cSo I had to figure out who I was, and I went to UCLA,\u201d she continued. \u201cAnd I\u2019ve always loved a good challenge, so I decided to take a calculus class. And I had taken calculus in high school, and I had done well in it, but I didn\u2019t think of myself as somebody who would do well at college math.\u201d<\/p>\n McKellar said that when she took her first midterm, she was dismayed to learn that her score was a disappointing 22 out of 40. However, she said it was a test to weed out from among the 163 students in the class who were actually good at math.<\/p>\n \u201cI know this because the professor graphed the scores, not with names,\u201d she noted. \u201cThere was one 22, there were two 15, and the rest was nine and below. I will never forget this \u2026 all these people in the class, you\u2019re like, [having] imposter syndrome, \u2018I don\u2019t belong here, all these other people are probably really smart.’\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAnd the next day, I kid you not, somebody tapped me on the shoulder and says, \u2018Excuse me, are you that girl? Aren\u2019t you that girl who got the 22?’\u201d McKellar recalled. \u201cIt was the greatest feeling, it was me chopping off my hair, getting it dyed black, and somebody saying, \u2018You\u2019re amazing.’\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt was just me. It had nothing to do with the superficiality of Hollywood or all the great writers and the sound design \u2026 and all the things they did to make Winnie Cooper [into] Winnie Cooper. It was just like, this is just me and my brain who did this.\u201d<\/p>\n McKellar said that she had been planning to major in film, but decided instead to pursue math. Eventually, she did turn back to acting, and in recent years<\/a> has been a staple on the Hallmark Channel and the Great American Family channel.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n