Nancy Cartwright is known to millions of fans of The Simpsons as the voice of Bart Simpson. In October, 2000, Nancy released her autobiography My Life as a Ten-Year-Old Boy. In her book, Nancy Cartwright describes her childhood in Ohio, her big move to California, and her amazing career as an actress and voice talent.

I had the amazing honor to spend an hour interviewing Nancy Cartwright on the telephone.

We discussed her book, her life and her career. Read on to learn more about Nancy Cartwright, the voice of Bart Simpson.

Nancy Cartwright grew up as part of a big family in Kettering, Ohio, just south of Dayton. Her first experience in making people laugh came at the age of ten. She entered a school contest for fourth through eighth graders. The competition was designed with the purpose of introducing the kids to performing in front of a group (perfect!). Nancy put together a ten-minute skit of Rudyard Kipling's How the Camel Got His Hump. She ended up not only winning in her own 4th grade level, but eventually won in the final competition, beating out all the kids in the entire school. This was the beginning of what eventually became Nancy's passion in life: to be an entertainer.

Because of Nancy Cartwright's impressive performance in the school contest, Nancy was asked to be part of The Summer Youth Theatre Company. She was thrilled at the opportunity and performed for five summers, doing original children's theater productions, traveling all around Ohio with kids a bit older than herself and loving it.

"The Mayor of Kettering issued a proclamation that, officially, November 2nd of every year is Nancy Cartwright Day... I felt like the bride."

Nancy definitely had been bitten by the acting bug. At sixteen, she went on to perform in The Centerville Town Hall Players production of Wait Until Dark. Then she played Nurse Preen in her sophomore class play, The Man Who Came to Dinner.

Nancy Cartwright also joined her high school speech team. For two years in a row, she competed in and won the National District's competition in Humorous Interpretation held at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. Many Moons and 13 Clocks, both children's stories by James Thurber, helped her discover her talent at doing numerous voices. Noticing her gift, Ohio University offered her a scholarship.