With brand-new baby Beckett Edward Packham at home, "Rita Rocks" star Nicole Sullivan is especially happy to have the regularity of her Lifetime series schedule -- and happy about the fact her set is just 10 minutes away from the home she shares with husband Jason and their boys, Beckett and two-year-old firstborn, Dashel.

Even so, the actress, who got her comedic start on the popular sketch comedy series "MADtv" admits that there are times she misses getting the chance to do characters and impressions.

"When I see a really good public meltdown like a good old-fashioned Britney Spears head shaving, I definitely miss it because I want to get in there and poke fun at it. Plus, now there's all those new horrible reality shows like the Kardashians so it would be fun imitating that stuff," says Sullivan.

She finds, "In general, sketch comedy is a game for younger people. It just requires a lot of energy and sort of blind dedication that I'm not sure you have when you get older."

While Sullivan is out of the sketch comedy game, she certainly hasn't lost her funny bone. Working on the Lifetime series has only made her even more grateful for the things she learned on "MADtv."

"Oh absolutely. I owe everything to 'MADtv.' It really was baptism by fire," she tells us. "I didn't really know what I was doing in comedy and I was thrown in with a bunch of people who were incredibly well trained from the Groundlings, etc. I wasn't particularly trained in comedy so I got to learn from them on the job. It was tough but it was a great way to learn."

Nicole says that after her stints on "MADtv" and "The King of Queens," however, she craved a job that would give her the chance "to be a real actress again" -- and that was one of the reasons she was attracted to "Rita Rocks," in which she plays a wife and mother who plays in a garage rock band.

The character has dimension, she points out, even though "it's a sitcom and of course, we want people to laugh. I'm sort of a goofy actress and they wanted to use those skills. There's some physical comedy thrown in here and there, and I'd be lying to say I don't throw in my own stuff. I make a lot of quirky expressions. I always say I could never get Botox because I'd blow through it in two days."

She perfected her career-baby schedule management skills with Dashel, whose nanny would bring him over for lunch at the set each day. He'd have his "bananas and watermelon and mess up my wardrobe," she fondly recalls.

Juggling the demands of work and motherhood is "hard and frustrating and some days you feel like crying. Other days, things work out and you get home early."

The show (with Rita pregnant this season) returns to the air in October.

Emily-Fortune Feimster