Katey Sagal looks back on 'Married With Children' 30 years later

— -- "Married With Children" first premiered 30 years ago today, and at the time, it was like no other sitcom that had come before it.

The series centered on unhappy shoe salesman Al Bundy, played by Ed O'Neill, his nagging wife Peggy, played by Katey Sagal, and their children, Kelly and Bud.

Sagal, 63, spoke to ABC News and said no one in the cast really thought the show could last as long as it did -- 10 years in all.

"I remember reading the script and thinking, 'This is hysterically funny, but no one will watch it because it's just too outside the box. We'll get cancelled immediately,'" she said. "It was on a network nobody had heard of."

That network, Fox, played the show three times a night because they had nothing else to air, Sagal said.

What Sagal also recalled about the show is that her co-star O'Neill, now 70, "instantly made me laugh."

"We had great chemistry together," she said. "I just remember going to work and laughing all the time and I'm not exaggerating."

"Married With Children" of course didn't get cancelled early, and the cast realized it was a hit a few seasons in when they started to see crowds at their promotional tours.

"[But] we just sort of figured they're renewing us because they have nothing else, but we knew we were funny," she said. "We thought it was really funny, but we were surprised it caught on as big as it did."

As for the obvious talk of a reunion, Sagal said it comes up quite often.

"I know David Faustino [Bud] was trying to put together something that was going to be like a spin-off and Eddie, Christina [Applegate] and I said, 'Yes, we'd do the pilot,' then ... the breaks got put on it," she said. "I don't know if it will ... maybe that's the fate of the Bundys, to never come back! Like everybody else does, but we don't."

Sagal went on to star in hit shows like "Sons of Anarchy," while O'Neill joined "Modern Family" and Applegate was featured in films like "Anchorman."