At a time in the 1980s when most of his peers were busy slathering Sea Breeze on their zits and trying to improve their Pac-Man scores, 13-year-old soap-opera superfan Michael Ausiello was building an empire. He’d already tasted success thanks to Guns & Greed, the daytime drama that he’d written, directed and executive-produced at Roselle Park (NJ) High. But he wanted more — a lot more. So the auteur created a second serial, Beverly Hills (no relation to primetime’s 90210, and yes, Aaron Spelling is lucky Ausiello never sued!).

For three years, Michael served as the sole showrunner, which left him overseeing an expansive narrative that rotated nearly 30 series regulars. He also launched a Beverly Hills fan club, merchandising line and companion magazine.

In total, he wrote 513 episodes, each one scrawled on a yellow legal pad. And miraculously, he saved everything, from the fake fan-club newsletters to the spreadsheets tracking his fake cast’s per-season episode count.

(How else could he ensure that their fake contractual minimums were met?)

At the time, Michael was often told that he was missing out on the fun that boys his age were expected to have. But that assessment, as myopic as it may have been well-intentioned, only served to underscore the reason that he immersed himself so completely in his fictional world: The real one didn’t quite know what to do with a slightly effeminate, increasingly obese, TV-obsessed, closeted gay kid. Beverly Hills allowed him to play, to experiment and, ultimately, to survive.