Mary Beth Evans and Stephen Nichols often answer fan questions on the official Days of Our Lives website.

Below, they respond to a couple of inquiries related to the show and their characters:

Q: What are your favorite characteristics of Steve and Kayla?
Mary Beth: I like that Kayla stands up for what she believes in.
Stephen: Patch is an honorable guy. He always does what he says he's going to do. He's compassionate and he loves children...he tries to protect the little ones.

Q: Do you have any say in the direction of the show?
Stephen: In terms of the writing and the storyline, no. We could probably throw ideas out there and tell them what we think, but we don't have much control over that. What we do have control over is what goes on on the set while we're doing the scenes, we can throw those in. There's a real collaboration, especially now that there are new people there. They are smart and listen to the actors.
Mary Beth: It's great now, too, because we actually get notes...GOOD notes...and it's great. We can always use improvement and tips to tweak it and make it better. It's just way more collaborative now and so much more fun!

Matt Richenthal is the Editor in Chief of TV Fanatic. Follow him on Twitter and on Google+.