Can you believe it took EIGHT nominations for Jeanne Cooper to win a Daytime Emmy? The soap icon -- who has played boozy billionairess Katherine Chancellor on "The Young and the Restless" since 1973 -- was stunned when she won this year.

"Your mind explodes!" the Outstanding Lead Actress tells SOAPnet.com. "Never in a million years did I expect this. It's wild! I think I fainted for a second ... My knees were so weak, I needed ["Guiding Light" star] Gina Tognoni -- the gal who won Supporting Actress -- to help me up the stairs to the stage."

As "Restless" watchers know, Jeanne's Emmy was looong overdue. It sure can't be easy to be nominated year after year, but never win; if anybody understands that, it's the lady who plays Erica Kane. "Susan Lucci was marvelous," Jeanne happily recalls. "She was there with this great grin on her face and congratulated me. Then we hugged and I told her, 'I don't think I could have made it for 19 years like you did!'"

Watch Jeanne and her sons celebrate her victory backstage at the Daytime Emmys with SOAPnet.com!