Work-at-home soccer mom has a funny goal

It all started with a lie a couple of years ago, when suburban housewife and mother of two Cheryl Anderson told her family she was off to Target for some shopping when she actually was headed to an open-mike comedy night at the Sacramento Clarion Hotel.

"I knew my kids would just die of embarrassment if they found out," Anderson said in a recent telephone interview from her Folsom home.

Other open-mike nights followed, including the Tuesday night series at Louie's Cocktail Lounge in Rancho Cordova where "there's always a pool tournament or something going on, and the people aren't there for comedy at all. It's good to do it for an audience that isn't really interested in hearing you," she said.

Eventually, Anderson had to tell her family, of course. She was doing well and performing more often – and why were there no bags of merchandise being hauled into the house? After a couple of months, she told her older daughter, now 21, when she "thought she could handle it.

"Then I had her go with me. She's pretty good about telling me what works and what doesn't."

Anderson, 47, also accepts her daughter's suggestions on material. "I have a really immature sense of humor – like a 12-year-old boy," she said.

Her younger daughter, 13, likewise has a more mature sense of humor, Anderson said. "I would never say anything that was too personal, but having a mom who makes fun of herself on stage is just not cool (to a 13-year-old)."

Anderson will host the Mother's Day weekend comedy shows at Laughs Unlimited in Old Sacramento. It's her first booking for an entire weekend – but it's not her biggest audience. The Anderson family – there's a husband, Mike, who by now also knows about the second career – recently returned from a cruise to Mexico where Cheryl the Soccer Mom (as she's billed) performed along with four singers for a room of 500. She's worked in some casino rooms that hold 200 to 300, too, "which is just unbelievable to me," she said.

"When I started, I had such horrible stage fright. At a wedding, when they'd pass the mike around for everybody to say something, I'd have a panic attack.

"I knew it was a fear that I would have my whole life if I didn't do something about it. So I just kept going and doing it and slowly (the panic) passes."

Before she became Cheryl the Soccer Mom, Anderson was the owner and founder of WAHM.com, a Web site for work-at-home mothers, which she sold last year to concentrate on comedy. She has written two humor books, the more recent of which, "It's a Jungle Out There and a Zoo in Here," about the challenges of working at home, was published by Time Warner and became a top 100 best-seller on Amazon.com.

At least Anderson's billing isn't based on a lie. "We are a suburban family, with two kids and a minivan. My kids actually have played soccer, so I am a soccer mom – unlike Larry, who has never installed a cable as far as I know."

Anderson hopes at some point to drop the "soccer mom" moniker. "Most of my act is PG-13ish," she said. "And it's not mom humor. It's kind of ...

" Don't expect 'Kids Say the Darndest Things,' OK?"

Mother's Day Comedy Weekend

WITH: Host Cheryl Anderson and headliner Cash Levy

WHEN: 8:30 and 10:30 tonight and Saturday, and 8 p.m. Sunday

WHERE: Laughs Unlimited, 1207 Front St., Old Sacramento

TICKETS: $15 tonight, $20 Saturday and $10 Sunday (All moms – have been, never been, want to be, or don't – admitted free on Mother's Day.)

INFORMATION: (916) 446-8128

RESERVATIONS: (916) 446-5905

About the writer:

• Call The Bee's Jim Carnes, (916) 321-1130.