Patricia Helen Heaton (born March 4, 1958) is an American actress and comedian. She is best known for her work on sitcoms, having played Debra Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond (1996–2005) as well as Frances "Frankie" Heck on The Middle (2009–2018). Heaton is a three-time Emmy Award winner – twice winning the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for Everybody Loves Raymond, and a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Culinary Program as host of Patricia Heaton Parties (2015–2016) Patricia Heaton was born in Bay Village, Ohio, the daughter of Patricia (Hurd) and Chuck Heaton, who was a sportswriter for The Plain Dealer. When she was 12, her mother died of an aneurysm. The fourth of five children, Heaton was raised as a devout Catholic. Heaton has three sisters, Sharon (now a Dominican nun, and presently assistant registrar at Aquinas College in Nashville), Alice, and Frances, and one brother, Michael, who died in September 2022 at the age of 66 and was the "Minister of Culture" columnist for The Plain Dealer and a writer for the paper's Friday Magazine