'Parenthood' Star Lauren Graham on Finding Love on Set: 'We Were Just Together'

"Parenthood" and "Gilmore Girls" star Lauren Graham is famous and adored by fans, but neither came easily.

"Acting is the most bizarre profession. You can stay in it for years and not really be in it, and be waiting for someone to give you an opportunity," she says in the new issue of More magazine. "It's like when I watch 'American Idol' and see people who have been told to believe in themselves at all costs: It's not always a good idea."

And, she adds, "I've been on a diet for 35 years."

Graham also opens up about her childhood with a largely absent mother. "[She was] a person who needed to find herself. She was in a band, she was a painter, she designed clothes -- she was so talented in so many ways," Graham says. "She gave me exposure to a world I would never have seen otherwise. I only view that as a positive in having an example of the possibilities."

She did get some motherly advice from Diane Keaton, her co-star from the 2007 movie "Because I Said So," when Graham was thinking of writing a book. "If she had told me to consider a career in banking, I would have done that."

The banking industry will have to wait, though; Graham accomplished her goal, and her first novel, "Someday, Someday, Maybe," will hit the shelves on April 30. Perhaps she was inspired by a "Parenthood" storyline that featured her character, Sarah, trying to be a playwright.

[Related: 'Parenthood' at PaleyFest 2013: Will There Be a Season 5?]

"Someday, Someday, Maybe" tells the story of a young actress in New York City struggling to find herself and love. In her own quest for love, Graham found it on the set. She's been dating Peter Krause, who plays her brother on "Parenthood" (yes, a little weird, but also cute), for a couple of years. They actually had met years before, in 1995, while guest-starring on "Caroline in the City."

"It was just a funny timing thing. We were friendly. But our lives went in separate directions," she says. "I would see him now and again. It wasn't like I thought, 'Oh, someday.'

"When they ended up on "Parenthood," she says, "We were just together."

As for marriage, the 46-year-old actress hasn't been in a rush to say "I do."

[Related: Lauren Graham on Alexis Bledel's Engagement to Vincent Kartheiser]

"For whatever reason -- it could have been my upbringing or whatever -- but the idea of getting married when I was in my 30s panicked me," she explains. "I was very ambitious. I just wasn't ready."

For now, she's got a loving family on the set. Aside from Krause, Graham is very close to her TV kids, Mae Whitman and Miles Heizer. They even wear matching necklaces!

Check out photos of Graham: