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Updated: 7/22 (7:21pm)

Sad news, friends.

Estelle Getty, who portrayed Sophia Petrillo on The Golden Girls died today. The full story here.

I'm actually not kidding when I say that I was pretty shocked. Not upset. Just shocked. Growing up, my brother and I pretty much dominated the TV at our house. (Who's the Boss?, Family Ties, Saved By the Bell, Growing Pains, Head of the Class, Simpsons, Seinfeld, Bulls basketball, and Cubs baseball). Our dad would pretty much watch whatever we wanted. So my mom was kind of out of luck. But she always had to watch The Golden Girls. It was by far her favorite show. And it was fine with us, because we kind of liked it.

Who doesn't love a group of crazy old ladies?

Some Golden Girls Trivia (courtesy of Imdb.)

Rue McClanahan was to play Rose and Betty White was to play Blanche but they switched roles because they didn't want to be typecast.

Estelle Getty (Sophia) is 15½ months younger than Beatrice Arthur (Dorothy), even though Sophia is Dorothy's mother.

In the pilot episode Blanche's surname is Hollingsworth, not Devereaux (as in subsequent episodes). Blanche's maiden name was Hollingsworth, her married name was Devereaux.

When asked by Rose about her marriage in the first episode of the series, Dorothy says she is from Queens. In all the other episodes, Dorothy says she is from Brooklyn.

All four actresses won Emmys for their performances.

In Episode 8 of Season 1 (The Break In), Rose says that her hometown is Little Falls. In all the episodes after that, she says that her hometown is St. Olaf.

It took 45 minutes in make-up for Estelle to be transformed into Sophia.

Estelle Getty suffered from stage fright, every Friday night for 26 weeks during the show's taping.

When the original pilot script was submitted to Disney/Touchstone, 'Michael Eisner' liked it but he felt something was missing. He thought a show about three old women living together might scare away younger viewers. He asked Susan Harris to keep working on it. Harris then added the character of Sophia. When she was added, Dorothy became just another woman dealing with her mother and Eisner loved it. After Sophia was added and a pilot was shot, a character named Coco, a gay male servant was cut from the series.

In several episodes which showed flashbacks to when Dorothy and Sophia were living in New York during the '40s and '50s,

Estelle Getty appears without the wig and makeup.

When the actresses trying out for the part of Dorothy, the description of the character was "a Bea Arthur-esque role".

The writers of the show always tried to give Sophia the raciest lines. They did this because her character had a stroke earlier in life, which made her unable to control the things she was able to say.

Estelle Getty was the second youngest of the four women, yet she played the eldest.

The show garnered a total of 57 Emmy nominations.

Estelle Getty played Sophia on six different shows: "The Golden Girls" (1985), "The Golden Palace" (1992), "Empty Nest" (1988), "Blossom" (1991), "Nurses" (1991) and "Ladies Man" (1999).

In the episode "Wham, bam, thank you Mammy", Blanche is called "Blanche Marie Hollingsworth, but in a later episode she says her full name is "Blanche Elizabeth Deveraux" (B.E.D.)

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