for 25 years, the diva foundation, founded by actress and hiv activist sheryl lee ralph has focused on hiv and aids awareness, erasing stigmas and providing testing. joining us today, tony award sheryl lee ralph. welcome back to "here and now." >> thank you. it is good to be here with you right now. >> always a pleasure to see you. and you're always so much energy and looking beautiful. >> thank you very much. i think i owe it to myself to be the best me i possibly can be. i look in that mirror, and i've got to love what i see. >> [ laughs ] and we love what we see. >> oh, thank you very much. >> now, we've just marked another world aids day this month. >> 27th. 27th annual international aids day. and i looked on three major newspapers, and nothing -- not a red ribbon, not a mention -- nothing. that. >> well, it was big news here in new york. there was a lot of talk, a lot of reminders the state put forth a lot of money toward educating. >> $24 million. >> yeah. $200 million he's gonna actually ask the legislature for in january. >> i love it. $2.5 million the state has already focused

lee ralph in this week's positively black. >> the month of december started on a reflective note, world a.i.d.s. day. sheryl lee ralph joins us now. to say your involvement goes back decades may be an understatement. but you said you first got involved in this at the best and worst time of your life. >> oh, absolutely. >> explain that. >> as an original company member of "dream girls" on broadway, i mean, this was the best time in you cannot imagine what it was like to be up on stage, and anybody who was anybody was in the audience there to see the dreams, to experience "dream girls." now, that was also a time when you couldn't get a cab once the curtain came down. but that's a whole other story. >> that's a different segment, of course. >> but we were having the best time, and right in the middle of those great times our cast members just started dropping dead of this mysterious disease. they got sick and they died. no dying process like the one we have right now. no great medication. they had that kind of medication that was killing them, bunning them up from the inside out, and it was horrible. that's ho