Shawn was only 4 years old when he announced to his mother that he wanted to be an actor. She was pleased because Shawn was an only child and she was a single parent. She immediately enrolled him in an acting workshop for young children where, in a few short months, he was spotted by a talent agent and cast in the Steve Martin movie, The Jerk, as the youngest sibling in Martin's adoptive black family.

But in little over a year, Shawn's love affair with acting cooled. It was a lot of hard work and not as much fun as this active and athletic little child had imagined. His immediate reaction was to withdraw and lose interest in the audtion process and, as a result, roles for him became few and farther between. By the time he was 10, his mother, a computer engineer who spent 15 years developing software for the shuttle, realized that something had to be done. She laid down the law. "It's a waste of time and gas if you can't rise to the ocassion and put out the required creative energy at audtions," she told him. "soon I won't be willing to take you out on audtions. If you want an acting career, you've got to be serious about it NOW!"

Faced with his mother's ultimatum, Shawn turned himself around. He returned to commercial workshopd and acting classes with renewed enthusiasm and result, did seven national commercials in a row when he was 12.

He began making guest appearances on sit-coms and hour long dramas. In fact he became so busy during his early teen years, that his mother resign from the space program i order to manage his career. She soon started managing the careers of other young actors, too.

At 16, Shawn was asked to audtion for a role on Family Matters, then in its second season. Cast as Waldo Faldo the not-too-Bright but intensely loyal best friend of Eddie Winslow. Shawn quickly caught the attention of fans and has remain popular cast member ever since.

But at 17, tragedy struck. Without warning his mother died. "Her heart just stopped," Shawn explains. They had been extremely close. Just two of them had lived in a house in the Compton area of Los Angeles from the time Shawn was 6 months old. Today Shawn still lives in the same house. He's alone, but not lonely. Aunts, Uncles and 3 cousins his own age live nearby abd the home is convenient meeting plcae for all.

Shawn plans to stay in acting, but plans to further his education. Currently, while still a part of Family Matters, he is also attending Harbor City College. Later, he would like to take psychology courses at UCLA and eventually get a degree in family counseling. "An educated, intelligent actor is going to be more sucessful than one without schoolong," relates Shawn. "And I plan to be a successful actor for a long time."

I'd like to thank Clifton Coleman for sending me this article.