Ellen DeGeneres says goodbye to her eponymous talk show after 19 years

It’s been a long–and in later years, rocky–road for The Ellen DeGeneres Show, but the host finally said goodbye to her eponymous daytime talk show on Thursday. The emotional episode featured many callbacks to the first episode nearly two decades ago, including the return of first-ever guest Jennifer Aniston.

But first, the monologue: “I walked out here 19 years ago, and I said this is the start of a relationship. And today is not the end of a relationship, it’s more of a little break. You can see other talk shows now. I may see another audience once in a while,” DeGeneres joked at the top of the episode.

Reflecting on the historic nature of the program, she continued, “Twenty years ago when we were trying to sell the show, no one thought that this would work. Not because it was a different kind of show, but because I was different. Very few stations wanted to buy the show, and here we are, 20 years later, celebrating this amazing journey together.”

“When we started this show I couldn’t say, ‘gay’ on the show … I said it at home, a lot. ‘What are we having for our gay breakfast?’ Or, ‘Pass the gay salt.’ ‘Has anyone seen the gay remote?’ Things like that. But we couldn’t say, ‘gay,’” DeGeneres said. “I couldn’t say, ‘we’ because that implied that I was with someone. Sure couldn’t say, ‘wife,’ and that’s because it wasn’t legal for gay people to get married, and now I say ‘wife’ all the time.”

She went on, “Twenty-five years ago, they canceled my sitcom because they didn’t want a lesbian to be in prime time once a week. And I said, ‘OK, then I’ll be on daytime every day. How about that?’ What a beautiful, beautiful journey that we have been on together. And if this show has made you smile, if it has lifted you up, when you’re in a period of some type of pain, some type of sadness, anything that you’re going through, then I have done my job.”

Sharing a moment with sidekick tWitch, DeGeneres said she was proud of the “family atmosphere” they had created over the years (contrary to the reports that the comedian had fostered a toxic workplace environment, which came out shortly before she announced the show would be coming to an end).

During Aniston’s segment, the actor gifted DeGeneres a “Thanks for the memories” floor mat, throwing it back to the “Welcome” mat she had given the host for her first episode. Asked for advice about wrapping up a long-running series, the Friends alum recalled, “Well, I got a divorce and went into therapy, and then I did a movie called The Break-Up. I just kind of leaned into the end.”