Bachelor Nation alum Kelsey Anderson reacted to her dad, Mark Anderson, getting cast on the upcoming premiere season of The Golden Bachelorette starring Joan Vassos.
“Welllllll, would you look at that,” Kelsey, 26, wrote via her Instagram Stories, adding two star-struck emojis, on Tuesday, August 13, while sharing her father’s photo from the casting announcement.
In a separate slide, Kelsey called her dad, 57, “the sweetest,” referring to a clip that showed him expressing his thoughts about love.
“To be in love, it feels very warm, like, you just feel it,” Mark says in the clip. “Everything just, like, travels out of your heart — fills your body, makes you warm, makes you fuzzy — and it brings a lot of joy and happiness to life.”
The internet coined the name “Kelsey’s Hot Dad” for Mark after he was shown during hometown dates when his daughter brought Bachelor Joey Graziadei to Louisiana. While fans met the extended Anderson family, Kelsey opened up about her late mother, Denise, who was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008. Mark cared for his wife until her death in 2018.
Mark saw the connection between Joey, 29, and Kelsey, which was solidified even more by the hometown date.
“I want you to feel that feeling I had with your mom,” Mark told his daughter. “Because it’s the best feeling in the world.”
“It’s crazy! Oh my god, I’m going to cry,” Kelsey responded, admitting she was in love with Joey. The father-daughter duo hugged and Mark whispered, “I love you.”
Joey proposed to Kelsey during the season 28 finale, and they are currently engaged.
After Bachelor Nation went crazy for Mark, Kelsey confirmed that she would be fully supportive of her father looking for love on the reality dating show.
“I want my dad to get out there; I want my dad to date,” Kelsey said on the “Bachelor Happy Hour” podcast in June. “I think that my mom really would want him to. My mom, before she passed, always said, ‘I want you to find somebody else. I want you to find another love.’ Before she even was sick she would always say this. She just knew that she was going to pass before him.”
