Alley Mills was born on May 9, 1951, in Chicago, Illinois. A graduate of Yale in 1973, she studied acting at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. While still in college, Alley Mills scored a small role in the film Diary of a Mad Housewife (1970). She got her first lead role in 1979 in a short-lived television series about young lawyers entitled The Associates (1979), opposite a then yet-unknown Martin Short. After another failed sitcom in 1982, she finally caught a big break with a lead role in the critically acclaimed nostalgic 1960s-set family dramedy The Wonder Years (1988) playing matriarch Norma Arnold. After the show ended in 1993, Alley Mills continued work in television, landing a recurring role on the western drama Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman (1993) as Jane Seymour's sister. She also made numerous guest appearances shows such as NYPD Blue (1993), Sabrina, the Teenage Witch (1996)and Yes, Dear (2000). She made the leap to daytime television with a guest role on the CBS soap opera The Bold and the Beautiful (1987) as Pamela Douglas playing along-side Susan Flannery and Betty White in 2006. As the producers were thrilled with her performances, she was eventually offered a contract and continues to star on the show, occasionally taking some time off to do theatre work in the Los Angeles area, often together with her husband. Alley Mills is married to actor Orson Bean since 1993 and the couple lives in Venice, California.