Comic Taylor Tomlinson was just 16 when she caught the stand-up bug. That’s when she started performing at open mics in church basements in Orange County, Calif., where she grew up.

“It’s not a cool story,” Tomlinson says. “But … church audiences are very supportive — as long as you don’t say anything dark, edgy or blue.”

Over the years, Tomlinson’s material has shifted, with topics ranging from the perils of dating on apps to finding out she has bipolar II disorder. Though she was initially unsure about talking about her own mental health on stage, she says it’s helped her connect with the audience.

“I got such amazing feedback from people who had been struggling with their mental health, … how it made them feel seen and less alone and made them feel better about their own journey,” Tomlinson says.

Tomlinson describes her on-stage presence as “the sharpest, quickest, wittiest, most confident version” of herself: “When I started doing stand-up in high school, it felt like more of a persona, … like the version of myself that I knew I could be and wanted to become, but wasn’t yet,” she says. “And I think over the years, who I am off stage and who I am on stage have come together where I do feel that I am the same person everywhere.”

Earlier in the year, Tomlinson became the youngest ever late-night host. Her CBS show, After Midnight, has been described as a game show that centers on internet culture. Tomlinson also has three stand-up specials on Netflix: Quarter-Life Crisis, Look at You and Have It All. She’ll soon be traveling the country with her Save Me tour.

Interview highlights

On losing her mother to cancer when she was a child and how that affected her path to comedy

I’m not saying that everybody in comedy or any creative person has to come from this dark place and the only way you’re funny is if you have a darkness about you. I don’t think that’s true. But for me, that changed who I was and who I was going to become. And it changed my sense of humor. And it made me try really hard to prove myself in a way that I don’t think I would have if she were still alive. Because after you lose a parent, you’re still trying to impress them, and you’re still trying to be somebody that they would have liked and respected and loved and been proud of. And you’re hoping other people who knew them tell you that. …

I do rely on other people’s accounts of her, because there’s only so much you remember when you lose somebody at 8 years old. … Like my aunt has said to me, “Oh, your expressions on stage will remind me of her.” … And that means so much to me. And growing up, I wanted to be a writer before I wanted to be a comedian. And they would say, “Your mom was such a great writer.” And there’s so many ways I’m not like her. Like she was an extrovert. She was very bubbly. She was very charismatic. She was gorgeous. … I don’t think I shine brightly as she does and I, in a weird way, feel like my becoming a comedian and a professionally creative person and a writer is like my way of honoring the potential that was wasted by the universe taking her.

On why she left the church after her mom died

I had been told if you believe and pray and stay faithful, God will answer your prayers. And we had so many people praying for [my mom] and she believed she was going to get better. And so to watch your mom die of cancer, even while everybody gathers around her and lays hands on her and supports her and prays for her and then for them to turn around and go, “Well, God did heal her. He just healed her in a different way. She’s healed in heaven.” And I was like, whoa, OK. Like, the rewrite on that is crazy. It made me question everything. And slowly over the next 10 years, I felt like I was struggling to stay in it the whole time I was growing up, and I just felt like I was a bad Christian because I didn’t, in my heart, agree with everything.

On being diagnosed with bipolar II disorder

I tried so many antidepressants and they weren’t working for me, and I was having terrible side effects. … It was certainly a years-long process trying to find what worked for me.

Then when I finally did find what worked for me, I sort of worked backwards from that and was like, oh, this makes sense. … I had so much shame around that diagnosis when I first got it, and I was embarrassed that I felt ashamed because I’ve never judge anybody else who had it. But when it’s you, it’s somehow different, which is why I started writing jokes about it.

On deciding to joke about having bipolar

I remember my therapist said to me, “Maybe we don’t talk about this on stage.” And I was like, “I’ve already done it.” … Once you write one joke and it hits and you really like the joke, you’re like, well, it’s got to go in the act. … But when I filmed [Have It All], I felt great about those jokes and then in the months waiting for it to come out, I started panicking and was like, Oh no, I can’t un-share any of this.

Over the years, I’ve gotten better about editing myself and deciding what is going to go in the act and what I’m just going to keep private. But it’s a lot of trial and error. … The guiding light for me has been even if something kills on stage, do I feel good telling it every night, or do I dread that bit coming up? I have done jokes about very personal things that I took out of the act because I was dreading getting to that part of the hour every night, and I was like, ooh, that’s probably a sign that I’m not ready to talk about this yet. … I also run jokes by family members and friends before I do them, because a joke is not worth destroying a relationship, in my opinion.

Heidi Saman and Susan Nyakundi produced and edited this interview for broadcast. Bridget Bentz, Molly Seavy-Nesper and Beth Novey adapted it for the web.