She may not be as abrupt as the acid-tongued defense attorney she plays on OLTL, but Florencia Lozano (Téa) learns from her character's tough manner.

"I think I'm a little softer than Téa," Lozano says. "But she does teach me a lot. She's shown me that you can recover if you do something wrong. She's less afraid than I am about offending people, or saying the wrong thing. She's completely unapologetic. That's a fun thing to play. And it's very freeing."

In her first few episodes as the newest member of Antonio's defense team, Téa traded barbs with nearly every character in the "Who Killed Carlo?" storyline. "Working with Hillary Smith (Nora) and Kamar (De Los Reyes, Antonio) and Patricia Mauceri (Carlotta) has been great. Kevin Stapleton (Kevin) is fun to work with, too. There's a great feeling amongst the cast."

Lozano, who was born in Princeton, NJ, holds a bachelor's degree in comparitive literature from Brown University in Rhode Island and a master's degree in acting from New York University. She is fluent in three languages, including her parents' native tongue, Spanish.

"My parents are from Argentina," says the actress, who is named for her mother's favorite city, Florence, Italy. "My mom was a Spanish teacher, and both my parents spoke English as well as Spanish. So I learned English at home and from watching Seasame Street, like other kids."

One of Lozano's sisters is a prosecuting attorney with the Queens, NY, DA's office; the other is a pediatrician in Seattle. "Getting a good education was the most important thing to my parents," Lozano says.

Her OLTL character is a legal firebrand whose interrogation skills could make a criminal cry. "Téa is very smart and very ambitious, but sometimes a little too ambitious," Lozano says.

The actress simply laughs at what the fans are saying about her character on the internet. "I understand people are calling her quite a bitch," she says. "That's fine with me-- it means I'm doing my job."