Lorna Fitzgerald played Lauren Branning’s sister from 2006 until 2018.
All things considered, Abi Branning had a lengthy tenure on EastEnders.
The younger daughter of lothario Max Branning (Jake Wood) and his second wife Tanya Cross (Jo Joyner), Abi (Lorna Fitzgerald) was first introduced in 2006.
Because of this, Abi was the older sister of Oscar Branning, the half-sister of Bradley Branning (Charlie Clements), and the younger sister of Lauren Branning (Madeleine Duggan, Jacqueline Jossa).
Sadly, Abi is no longer with us, and Lauren has expressed her longing for her younger sister on several occasions.
What is the current status of Abi Branning on EastEnders?
What happened to Abi Branning in EastEnders?
In the episode of EastEnders that aired on January 19, 2018, Abi Branning passed away.
During her twelve years on screen, young Abi matured before our eyes and also developed into a more complex character. She was first introduced as her father’s little girl in 2006.
Abi suffered as a child from her parents Max and Tanya’s turbulent marriage, which saw them part ways and then get back together several times.
Despite conflict with her friend Lola Pearce (Danielle Harold), Abi discovered her first love in her teens when she fell in love with Jamie Borthwick’s character, Jay Brown.
Abi tried to help her older sister Lauren through her alcoholism while still keeping her relationship with Jay intact. This ultimately led to Tanya and Oscar permanently leaving Walford in 2013.
After much effort, Abi eventually intended to attend college, and Jay was supposed to follow. However, when her childhood friend Ben Mitchell (then portrayed by Harry Reid) returned, it became evident that Jay had feelings for Lola, and he broke up with her.
In 2014, Abi became a resentful and darker person as a result of this and the incident in which she ran over her pet dog, Tramp.
Abi starts dating Ben even though she is aware that he is gay but is in denial about it. Abi fabricates a story claiming that her father Max mistreated his lover Lucy, leading to Max’s arrest and unjustifiable one-year imprisonment. Ben is arrested for the murder of Lucy Beale (then Hetti Bywater).
Ben is cheating on Abi with Paul Coker (Jonny Labey), and Abi quickly finds out.
Encouraged by her cunning new friend Babe Smith (Annette Badland), Abi told Ben a falsehood about her pregnancy in order to maintain her friendship with him. Abi insisted that she wanted the child even after Ben asked her to end the pregnancy.
But later on, when both she and Ben acknowledged testing positive for chlamydia, Babe shoved Abi during a fight between Ben and his father Phil (Steve McFadden) in the Queen Vic, causing Abi to pretend to be pregnant.
Eventually, thanks to a resentful Babe, a blackmailing Louise Mitchell (Tilly Keeper), and Abi’s confession to Ben, the truth emerged that Abi had fabricated her pregnancy.
After humiliating Abi in the pub and revealing her behavior, Ben was emotionally coerced by Babe to quit her position at the Vic.
Before Abi exacts revenge by imprisoning Babe in the Vic freezer and almost killing her, she makes Babe a pariah by exposing all of her own transgressions. Following this, Babe set up her sister Sylvie Carter (Linda Marlowe) as the culprit, and both Babe and Abi returned to their tense truce at the Vic.
After Babe left Walford in 2017, Abi kept working at the Vic while pursuing her veterinary degree.
After starting an affair, Abi discovered that Steven Beale (Aaron Sidwell), Lauren’s boyfriend, was fabricating a brain tumor in order to maintain his unstable relationship with her. She helped him with this by providing him with scans and medication from her veterinarian practice. Meanwhile, Lauren had secretly ended her relationship with Steven.
Later on, Abi found out she was expecting a child with Steven; however, a fire put them all in danger, including a furious Max. After that, Abi happily informed Steven that he would soon become a father, but he passed away from injuries he received in an altercation with Max during the fire.
Following Steven’s passing, Abi wept for her beloved and horrified Lauren by disclosing all of their secrets.
Because of her behavior, Abi was fired from the veterinary clinic and was laid off from the Queen Vic, but she continued to be pregnant with Steven’s child and eventually got help from Lauren.
When Abi returned to the Square in late 2017, she discovered that Max had become the public enemy number one after he and James Willmott-Brown (William Boyde) started plotting revenge on Walford through plans for property redevelopment.
Abi and her father made up, despite their disagreements and Max’s exclusion.
Tanya visited Walford again on Christmas Day 2017, revealing Max’s additional transgressions, including his part in Steven’s demise.
An erroneous Then, Max went to the Queen Vic’s roof to try suicide, which prompted Abi and Lauren to scale the ledge he was standing on and talk him down.
Nevertheless, because of the severe weather, Lauren slipped and she and Abi both fell to the ground below.
Abi was left in a coma and later deemed brainstem dead, whereas Lauren recovered fully from her wounds.
Max refused to believe that his daughter would awaken after Abi’s baby girl was delivered via caesarean section.
In January 2018, Max was there with Lauren and Tanya as they turned off Abi’s life support, finally realizing that he had lost Abi for good.
Max concentrated on raising Abi’s daughter, Abi Branning Jr., in memory of her late mother, after Abi’s funeral in February 2018.
