Kelly Ripa Wasn't Mark Consuelos' Type When They Started Dating

By Hollywood standards, Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos are an especially enviable couple. They've been together for almost three decades and didn't even have to leave the industry to keep their marriage intact while steering clear of all-too-common cheating scandals. The enduring lovebirds now get to work together full-time as co-hosts of "Live! With Kelly and Mark." But, according to Consuelos, marrying Ripa wasn't on his mind when they first met or even during their initial relationship. 

The pair was famously introduced during a screen test for the hit soap opera "All My Children." Ripa had been on the series for some time as Hayley Vaughan when the producers decided they wanted a Latino actor to play the part of her love interest, Mateo. Ripa sat through tons of auditions before they finally found the perfect Mateo. For her, it was love at first sight but for Consuelos, not so much.

That's not to say Consuelos wasn't attracted to the soap star; he has admitted he found her very alluring. Rather, Ripa didn't fit the bill because there wasn't one. Consuelos bucked creating a list of ideal traits in a potential partner and decided he was up for trying anything. As he explained on "Live!," "When I was dating, I would say I was very open. [I cast] a wide net. A wide, wide net," as Decider reported.

Clearly, Kelly Ripa couldn't be defined as Mark Consuelos' type back when they met in 1995 because the "Riverdale" alum didn't have a dream girl in mind. He confirmed as much on "Live! With Kelly and Mark," elaborating, "I didn't have a type," to which Ripa chimed in that he "like[d] them wild," back then, per Decider. The TV host heard a few of his dating stories directly from the source but also got intel on his type from Consuelos's mother.

The "Riverdale" star acknowledged that his former paramours were good fun but Ripa took a different stance. In a previous episode, she clarified, "Well, according to people in your past who shall remain nameless, you had a wild attraction to women who were not necessarily good for you. Let's put it that way. Maybe not the most feet planted firmly on the ground."

The celebrity couple loves giving fans an insight into their home life on their morning talk show, but otherwise, they keep things private. Consuelos wasn't very forthcoming with who he went out with before Ripa, and there are very few tabloid mentions of the actor's previous love interests. His wife believes it's because his longest relationship outside theirs lasted around four months, a statement he denies, stating it was closer to 18.

Unlike her future husband, Kelly Ripa instantly knew that Mark Consuelos was the one for her. On the podcast "Lunch with Bruce," Ripa confessed, "I saw my husband in a photograph before I saw him. I knew when I saw his photograph." She was referring to the picture given to her by Judy Blye Wilson, the casting director on "All My Children." At the time, Ripa didn't have matrimony on her mind either. 

But she divulged, "When I saw him, the photograph of him, I saw my entire future with him flash before — like I saw it," and it naturally included a wedding. Consuelos experienced a different set of realizations, telling HuffPost, "I thought she was adorable, hot and sexy and all that stuff, but I was very focused — I didn't really think I had a chance with her, so I wasn't really focused on that." 

However, the longtime morning show host was on a mission to make her vision come true, and they quickly started dating on the down-low. Ripa and Consuelos eloped after a minor breakup less than a year after they began their romantic relationship. Judging by their adorable social media posts, they're still very much in love and the perfect match — even if it took Consuelos a while to realize it.