Rachel Melvin was born February 9, 1985 in Elmhurst, Illinois. At age 4 she moved to Phoenix, Arizona where she graduated with honors in 2003. Immediately after graduation, she moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in acting, turning down a full scholarship at Arizona State University. She moved to California after she won a 600 dollar jackpot in a bingo game in a casino, one day before the gambling age was raised from 18 to 21 in Arizona.
Her first acting job was for a role in an independent film Boo. Her major project was that of Days of Our Lives where she played Chelsea Benson. Melvin has also guest-starred on Summerland, Jack & Bobby and 8 Simple Rules. Yet she gained mainstream popularity when she started playing the role of
Chelsea Brady in NBC’s long-running soap Days of our Lives.
Melvin is also a singer and electric violin player. Little do her fans know that Melvin also had topnotch musical theater training at the Clear Lake Drama Festivals in Group Acting, Improv, Mime, Storytelling and Lip Sync. In fact, when she was a teenager, she was a National Finalist for the Teen Choice Awards representative contest and choreographed the Mountain Pointe Dance Company concerts in Arizona. Melvin plays the electric red violin and she also sings. She also writes children's book. When she is not busy filming, she helps out children with the American Diabetes Association and animal charities. She currently resides in Los Angeles and is married to actor Rey-Philip Santos.