Emmerdale is a British soap opera first broadcast on 16 October 1972. The following is a list of characters that first appeared, by order of first appearance. The first character to be introduced was (Gillian Kearney) in January. Nurse (Danny Horn) arrived in March and Lachlan White's (Thomas Atkinson) father, (Alan Convy) arrived in April. The year's first birth, , the son of Charity Dingle (Emma Atkins) and Ross Barton (Michael Parr), occurred in June. (Micah Balfour) was also introduced during the same month. The second birth occurred in September as Vanessa Woodfield (Michelle Hardwick) gave birth to her and Kirin Kotecha's (Adam Fielding) child, . (Nicola Stephenson), the woman whom Paddy Kirk (Dominic Brunt) had an affair with, also began appearing in September. Additionally, multiple appeared in 2015.