Hayley arrived in Pine Valley on Thanksgiving Day 1990 with her hair dyed jet black in an Elvira hairdo with makeup to match (she was Pine Valley's answer to punk rock). She crashed Trevor and Natalie's party and announced that she was staying with them. Her mother Arlene soon followed and it was revealed that Hayley had spent a miserable childhood playing caretaker to her alcoholic mother. When Arlene crashed into Jack's car causing a pregnant Brooke to go into premature labor, Arlene pleaded with Hayley to lie and say she was driving to keep Arlene from going to jail on a DUI. Hayley complied. Hayley's boyfriend, Brian Bodine, knew the truth and convinced Hayley to come clean. Arlene went to jail. Hayley and Brian got engaged, but her ever-controlling father, Adam, saw to it that this relationship came to an abrupt end.