MIRANDA TAPSELL The greatest gift of all

When December 25 rolls around, acclaimed Australian actress, Miranda Tapsell, will be taking on her biggest role to date – that of mum. She reveals her roller-coaster road to pregnancy and her hopes and dreams for her much longed-for first baby.

- TIFFANY DUNK 

Barbara Tapsell vividly remembers the moment she learned she was about to be a grandmother. She and husband Tony were in the final days of their holiday to Melbourne to see their only child. It was a glorious sunny day and as her daughter emerged from taking a shower, hair freshly washed, she was glowing. “I just looked at her and thought, ‘Miranda looks different for some reason,” she tells The Weekly.

For Miranda Tapsell herself, the discovery would not happen for well over a month later. Having been trying to become pregnant for 18 months, she’d convinced herself that maybe a baby just wasn’t on the cards for her and husband James Colley, 31.

“I’d spent so long as a young woman learning about contraception and how not to get pregnant, that learning how to fall pregnant was a real shift,” she says. “It’s not as easy as people think. I got disheartened, it was like, ‘no, I’m not pregnant this time. Not this time either. So, I was at the point where I was quite pessimistic.”

The realization that the cycle of disappointment might have changed was a revelation. Taking yet another pregnancy test without much hope, she was startled to see those longed-for lines.

“I came downstairs to tell James and it was the most wonderful thing,” she smiles. “We were able to have that moment together and just savor it.”