How I Met Your Mother: Seasons 1 - 6

How I Met Your Mother is an American sitcom that premiered on CBS on September 19, 2005, created by Craig Thomas and Carter Bays.

As a framing device, the main character, Ted Mosby (Josh Radnor) with narration by Bob Saget, in the year 2030 recounts to his son and daughter the events that led to his meeting their mother, which explains the title and allows for a narration in the past tense. How I Met Your Mother follows Ted alongside his friends Lily Aldrin (Alyson Hannigan), Marshall Eriksen (Jason Segel), Robin Scherbatsky (Cobie Smulders), and Barney Stinson (Neil Patrick Harris).

How I Met Your Mother has been a critical success, and has received consistently strong ratings throughout its run. It has won five Emmy Awards, including a nomination for "Outstanding Comedy Series" in 2009.

Production: Inspired by the idea "let's write about our friends and the stupid stuff we did in New York," How I Met Your Mother is Bays' and Thomas' idea. The two drew from their friendship in creating the characters, with Ted based loosely on Bays, and Marshall and Lily based loosely on Thomas and his wife. Thomas's wife Rebecca was initially reluctant to have a character based on her, but agreed if they could get Alyson Hannigan to play her. Fortunately, Hannigan was available, and was looking to do more comedy work.
The bar MacLaren's, in which some of the show is set, is based on a bar in New York City called McGee's. It has a mural that Carter Bays and Craig Thomas both liked and wanted to incorporate into the show. The name for the bar is from Carter Bays's assistant, Carl MacLaren; the bartender in the show is also called Carl.