As I said in a column about the CBS sitcom, there's a twist at the end of the first episode — and now you all have had a chance to see it. (If it's still sitting unwatched in your recorder, stop reading here.)

It looked as if Ted (Josh Radnor) had found his match in Robin (Cobie Smulders) — until the end of the show revealed that Robin is not, in fact, the "mother" on the show; instead she's known to Ted's eventual children as "Aunt Robin."

That doesn't mean Smulders is out of the show. "It's going to be a complicated story," said Carter Bays, an executive producer on the show (and a former Buckeye). "(Ted) does meet this girl that he's crazy about, and you think she's going to be the one. We're going to see how having this person in his life affects how he goes about looking for the love of his life. … They have a great chemistry together and they become great friends. I think we want to explore what this relationship does become, if not that (romance). We want to see how she becomes a central part of his life, but not as his future wife."

"She becomes part of the group pretty quickly as a friend," added executive producer Craig Thomas. "It's not a 'will they' or 'won't they' between the two of them too much, because we know they don't ultimately."

Still, given that Smulders is appealing and there is chemistry between her and Radnor onscreen, I had to ask at the "Mother" press conference: "Can you promise here and now that Robin will not have a twin?"

"Twins, that's a good idea," said Bays.

"I'd love to play twins," added Smulders.

"They can do cool stuff with computers now, too," said Thomas.

To which I said: "Is that a yes or a no?"

And never got an answer. The producers still want to hold onto some surprise, and even their surprise could change. "We definitely have a plan in mind," said Thomas. "But at the same time, maybe things will meander, and we're open to that, too."

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