Woman found a binder hidden among her late grandmother’s tax papers and discovered a secret obsession no one knew about
Loss has a way of changing how we look at the ordinary things people leave behind. What first appears to be another item to sort through can suddenly become a window into a side of someone that few people ever saw. As reported by PEOPLE on Sunday, June 7, 2026, when TikTok user Madelyn Mikelson, who goes by @richplumm, was cleaning her grandmother's bedroom after she had passed away at the age of 82, Mikelson stumbled across a folder. Her grandmother was known to be particular about her finances, so Madelyn expected it to be a well-documented tax file. However, what she found inside after opening it left her stunned in the best way possible.
@richplumm I just know she's surrounded by hotties in heaven #celebrity #funny #grandma ♬ It's Raining Men - The Weather Girls
When she opened the binder, Mikelson discovered a carefully organized collection devoted to several celebrities her grandmother admired. Familiar names like A-ha frontman Morten Harket appeared throughout the pages, which did not surprise the family, given her longtime fandom. Others, including actor Keanu Reeves and even Matthew McConaughey, were more unexpected additions. Each page contained meticulously recorded details such as birthdays, heights, and other personal facts, a habit that felt perfectly in character for someone who loved numbers and keeping records.
One detail, however, genuinely caught her off guard. Mikelson's grandmother, Peggy Kelpe, had also noted the celebrities' zodiac signs, despite never showing any known interest in astrology during her lifetime, giving people a glimpse into a different side of her personality. The binder was created during her grandmother's retirement in 2013, which Mikelson believes gave her the freedom to reconnect with "a little bit more girlhood whimsy and hope" than many adults hold onto. She told the outlet that the timing of the project only reinforced that idea.
The celebrity binder was only part of the story. A follow-up video revealed that as Mikelson continued sorting through her grandmother's belongings, she found a phone gallery packed with male celebrity photos, which explained why the family was always helping her upgrade to phones with larger screens and more storage. However, according to another clip, alongside that playful side of her personality were plenty of quintessential grandmother finds, too, including vintage silk scarves and photos of Mikelson's mother from the 1990s.
We never really know what might surface when clearing out the belongings of a loved one, especially a grandparent. Grief has a strange way of turning ordinary objects into unexpected discoveries. Sometimes those finds are amusing, revealing quirks nobody knew about until years later. Other times, they offer a glimpse into a person's character that had gone unnoticed while they were alive. That was the case for deaf content creator Leila Hanaumi. While cleaning out her late grandfather's home four months after his passing, she came across an American Sign Language completion certificate from 2005.
The certificate represented far more than a course he had taken. After Hanaumi's grandmother, who had helped bridge communication within the family, passed away, her grandfather chose to learn ASL in his 60s. Nobody asked him to do it. Nobody expected him to do it. He simply wanted to maintain a relationship with his deaf granddaughter. Stories like Mikelson's are a reminder that grandparents existed long before they became grandparents. They had crushes, obsessions, inside jokes, and interests that had nothing to do with the families who came to know them later in life. That is the beauty of such discoveries!
For more such videos, you can follow @richplumm on TikTok.
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