Hannigan is rich in love, life - but 'Mother' character isn't so lucky

By Donna Freydkin, USA TODAY

NEW YORK - She's a long way from band camp.

Alyson Hannigan, who went from music nerd to sex kitten in the 1999 comedy American Pie, is now hitched, both on screen and in real life.

On her CBS show, HOw I Met Your Mother (Mondays, 8.30 pm (ET/PT), she and husband Marshal (Jason Segel) are having major money woes over his unemployment, her shopping addiction and the money-pit apartment they bought.

"I love being a part of a healthy couple. I can relate to that because I just adore my husband and our relationship. It's so important to me," says Hannigan, 34, who has been married to actor Alexis Denisof for four years.

In tonight's season finale, she says, "we deal with Marshall and Lily's debt problem, and he sets up a website to seel some of her clothes so they can pay the contractor to fix this apartment, the worst mistake they ever made."

But the cliffhanger, she says, involves Ted (Josh Radnor).

Could it also involve Britney Spears' character Abby, who appeared for the second time in last week's episode? She plays Barney's new girlfriend - who's really mad for Ted.

Hannigan says the singer, whose divorce, breakdowns and custody battles have kept tabloids in business for the past two years, is "lovely. She's so sweet and polite. She's quite shy. We sort of bonded the last time and talked about dogs and clothes, girlie things. And now, when she came this time, I had my puppy, Oliver, with me, and she got to meet him. She bonded with Oliver, and he gave her kisses.

She's welcome to come back anytimes, Hannigan says. "If you don't think of her as Britney Spears, she's just a very nice, normal person. The second time, she felt even more comfortable than the first time because she knew what to expect from us and that we're all nice.

"It's just when you leave the stage, the security - there are helicopters flying over to get shots of her. The first time, a helicopter followed her into work. This time, it was a little more subdued."

That word basically sums up Hannigan's rel life in Los Angeles. She and Denisof are spending some time this summer on the East Coast, visiting family, with Yorkie puppy Oliver in tow.

"My husband and I are just going to travel. We're going to drive down to his dad's farm in Maryland. I've never been there before, which is terrible - we've been together 8 1/2 years! I'm very excited."

So is Hannigan as much of a clotheshorse as Lily?

"Yeah, maybe. Yes. I wasn't always. In my mid-to late 20s, I woke up and realized I was a woman and loved shoes and bags and clothes. I'm shopping with a vengeance now," Hannigan says.

"We also have a philosophy that if you buy one thing, you donate another. My husband will literally buy one T-shirt and go home and find another T-shirt to donate to Goodwill. But I accumulate and purge.