On 30 December 1993, the Windsors visit Kim Tate's (Claire King) stables to see the horses and Donna wanders off.

The following year, Woolpack bar manager Terry Woods (Billy Hartman) gets into trouble with his boss Alan Turner (Richard Thorp) after Donna gets drunk with her half siblings Scott and Kelly.

One evening when her father Vic attempts to take a bb gun from Scott, Donna is shot in the head as a result but is only left with a scratch.

Donna, Marc and their friends are later involved in a hit and run accident in which leaves their headmistress, Jean Strickland dead.

When Viv remarries nearly three years after Vic's death, Donna has reservations about her new stepfather, Bob Hope (Tony Audenshaw) but soon warms to him and they become close.

They reunite when the Marsdens leave the village but it does not last as Robert pursues Katie Addyman (Sammy Winward) behind Donna's back.

[3] Donna forms an attraction to widower Marlon Dingle (Mark Charnock) but he is not interested in pursuing a relationship and she dates Danny Daggert (Cleveland Campbell) instead.

Prior to the wedding, Donna strikes up a close friendship with Max King (Charlie Kemp), whom she enjoys flirting with.

When Max is killed in a car crash, caused by Robert, Donna is devastated and Marlon tries to help her through her grief.

Desperate to get their foot on the property ladder, the couple enter a competition to win the new show home on the King’s River development.

However, Marlon and Donna's house explodes on the day of the grand opening in July 2006 as a result of a gas leak.

Three people are killed in the explosion and the body of murder victim Terence Turner (Nick Brimble) is discovered buried under the rubble at the site.

Now homeless and discovering Viv was pregnant with twins, Donna returns her money, which she receives from Tom King (Ken Farrington) as compensation.

They then make a formal application for guardianship but Lilith returns and the case against her collapses and she takes the children to Ireland with her.

Shane Doyle (Paul McEwan), Donna's colleague on the force, begins bullying her for her gender as well as her in-laws and their criminal records.

When he begins to force himself on her, Donna knees him in the groin and flees to her colleague Ross Kirk's (Samuel Anderson) house.

Donna, however, visits him in prison and Ross told her of his suspicions that Jasmine Thomas (Jenna-Louise Coleman), Debbie Dingle (Charley Webb) and Marlon's brother, Eli (Joseph Gilgun) had been acting suspiciously the night Shane went missing.

But Marlon is unable to forgive Donna for her betrayal and for going to see Ross behind his back and shopping his brother to the police.

Donna returns to the village with her four-year-old daughter, April (Amelia Flanagan), moving in with Bob and Brenda Walker (Lesley Dunlop).

During a hospital appointment, Donna is told that her cancer is more aggressive than they anticipated and only has six months to a year left to live.

Donna decides to leave the village, alongside April, but later returns when the store owner makes a full recovery and is unable to identify his attacker.

Ross and Donna are eventually tracked down by Gary North (Fergus O'Donnell), the owner of the jewellery store that they burgled.

Donna later visits Ross, as she has been worrying about him and she is stunned to find that he has obtained a gun, in order to carry out a job for Gary, who is blackmailing him and threatening to hurt his family.

As the situation escalates, Adam, Ross' half-brother who was acting as a lookout for them, crashes his car into Stephen's outside the club to create a diversion.

Donna was a little spoilt as a young child, often getting her own way but she was not as devious as her half-sister Kelly (Adele Silva), or as wild as half-brother Scott (Toby Cockerell; Ben Freeman).

[4] Both actresses told former series producer Kathleen Beedles separately last year that they would like to take a break from the soap.

[5] It was reported on 20 April that Emmerdale producers were hoping to dissuade Verity Rushworth from taking an extended break from the show.

An official statement from the soap earlier this month confirmed that the actress, who plays Donna Windsor-Dingle, may decide to take time off when her contract expires.

"Verity has been playing Donna for more than ten years so she's thinking about taking an extended break," an insider told the Daily Star Sunday.

[7] In an interview published by Digital Spy on 11 March 2014, Rushworth confirmed that she be appearing for five months and would depart again once the storyline has reached its conclusion.