When flight attendants Nina Williams and Paul Robinson met in the mid-1980s, they enjoyed a brief fling, with Paul unaware that it had left Nina pregnant. When they next met a few years later, Nina was working at a Women in the Workplace conference held at Lassiter's hotel, which was run by Paul and his wife Gail, and he was stunned to realise that he was the father of her three-year-old daughter, Amy. Nina was reluctant for Paul to become a part of Amy's life, as she was due to get married to a man named Bruce and felt that Amy didn't need a second father figure. But Gail knew how much Paul wanted to be a father and managed to persuade Nina to give him a chance, so she allowed him to set up a trust fund for Amy, and offered to keep in touch with letters and photographs, until Amy was old enough to be told the truth and make up her own mind. Nina, Bruce and Amy then moved to New Zealand.

By 1992, Nina and Bruce were having some marital problems, and so when Paul suddenly decided that he wanted to try and be a proper father to Amy, Nina agreed that he could take their daughter back to Australia for a few weeks. After a short, but eventful stay in Erinsborough, Amy returned home to her mum, but when Nina and Bruce's marriage came to an end, mother and daughter moved back to Australia, to be near Nina's parents in Mount Merrion.

Nina reinvented herself with a career in nursing and started calling herself 'Nene', but she also suffered from depression and anxiety, which made her unpredictable. By 2015, Paul was back in touch with Amy, after wrongly believing that he was dying from leukaemia, and she and her nine-year-old son Jimmy made a fresh start in Erinsborough, whilst Nene also seemed to have made a new life for herself, working at a hospital in Katoomba, where she claimed to have found love with a doctor. However, after only six months in the job, she made a sudden appearance in Erinsborough, causing Amy a fright when she bumped into Jimmy - who she referred to as 'Little J' - and took him off for a walk. Nene's arrival coincided with a heatwave, and soon she was unable to continue and collapsed under a tree, whilst Jimmy attempted to return to the Lassiter's complex and collect his bag, but he too was unable to carry on. Amy eventually found her son, while Nene was discovered by Dr Karl Kennedy, who she'd already bumped into briefly at Harold's Cafe earlier that day. Nene immediately saw him as her 'knight in shining armour' as she was taken to hospital to be treated and, as he'd taken his wedding ring off in the heat, she thought that she stood a chance with him.

Meanwhile, after learning from Jimmy that Nene was in town, Amy went to the hospital to see her mum, slightly confused about why she'd arrived unannounced. Amy was further concerned to learn that her mum had quit her job and decided on a fresh start in Erinsborough, though Nene insisted that there was nothing else behind her decision - though some strange texts indicated that she wasn't telling the whole truth. Having mistakenly propositioned Karl, who had to set her straight about his marital status, Nene was then released from his care, already talking about getting a job at the hospital and invited to stay at number 26, where Amy and Jimmy lived with Amy's boyfriend Kyle and his family.

A few days later, Amy approached Karl, asking if there were any nursing jobs available at the hospital, mentioning her mum's problems with her mental health. Nene reluctantly agreed to meet with him, but once alone, she admitted that her last job, at Katoomba Private Hospital, had ended badly after she'd had an affair with a doctor, who'd then blamed her for a mistake after they split up. Not wanting Amy to think that she was a failure, Nene asked Karl to keep her secret, and he arranged for an interview at the hospital. Though that interview wasn't a success, Karl vowed to help Nene - despite Susan's concerns that he was once again getting too close to a vulnerable woman - and when he heard that Alzheimer's sufferer Doug Willis needed a carer, he recommended Nene for the job. Though she felt that it wasn't quite the prestigious hospital role that would impress Amy, Nene decided to take the job. She soon started to find opportunities to spend more time with Karl, too, claiming that his guitar playing helped to calm Doug, and then pretending that he'd had one of his spells, calling Karl during a birthday lunch with an irritated Susan. Nene continued to confuse Doug, claiming that she was his wife Pam, and managed to intercept an email from one of her old colleagues in the Blue Mountains. After accessing Karl's laptop, witnessed by Doug, she replied, claiming that they didn't need to chat as Nene was only in town to visit her daughter, and wasn't looking for work.

It was when Nene then tried the same trick again, accessing Kyle's computer to see if he was still in touch with his wife Georgia, that things started to unravel for her. Kyle caught Nene, who claimed that she'd only been doing it for Amy's sake, as she couldn't stand to see him break her daughter's heart. When Kyle then mentioned the incident to the Kennedys, who were having lunch with Doug, he mentioned that he'd seen her on Karl's laptop, and they found evidence of the deleted email, realising that when Nene's old colleague had called to speak to Karl and give a positive reference, it must have been someone else she's roped in to pretend to be them. With the evidence piling up, Karl contacted her old hospital and found out that she'd been the one who'd made all of the mistakes, and had received warnings for her behaviour. Confronted by Kyle and the Kennedys, Nene was backed into a corner and admitted her mistakes, before running off in tears. As they all came to realise that Nene should perhaps look into going back onto medication for her mental health problems, and that everything she'd done was because she wanted to show Amy that she could cope on her own, Karl agreed not to report her, but explained that Doug's son Brad would need to be informed. Though shocked, Brad said that he'd have to speak to Doug before reporting Nene, and Doug, well aware of what it was like to lose control of your own mind, decided that he wanted to put the matter behind him.

Feeling that she'd let everyone down, Nene turned to Paul for support, and was surprised as he was one of her main supporters, helping to convince Karl not to report her behaviour. As she pointed out that he still owed her for everything that had happened in the past, he offered her a job as Creative Director at his motel. She accepted, and soon found herself falling for Paul all over again, surprising him by planting a kiss on him as he showed her around the motel. When Amy found out, she told Paul that Nene was still very delicate and that he needed to let her down gently, particularly, by his own admission, as he had feelings for Brad's ex-wife Terese. Though Nene seemed to accept what Paul was saying, and she announced that she was determined to get her health back on track before she looked for love again, it seemed that she wasn't quite being honest about her feelings, as she later gazed longingly at a photo of him.

Following an explosion at Lassiter's hotel the following week, Nene got herself into more trouble when she went to the hospital and put on a nurse's uniform, desperate to help. She was soon caught out by Doug's granddaughter Paige, who recognised her just as she was about to administer treatment to coma patient John Doe. Nene quickly went and found Amy, who had problems of her own, as she and Kyle had just split up, and he was planning to leave for Germany, to reunite with his wife Georgia. As Kyle then left, and Amy struggled to deal with both her mum and her break-up, Nene turned to Paul, who quickly took advantage of her. Having been accused of causing the hotel explosion, Paul asked Nene to give him an alibi, playing on her loneliness and desperation by claiming that they were family and had to support each other. Believing that Paul still had feelings for her, she gave the false alibi to the police, but was upset to later return and find Paul kissing Terese. Finally coming to her senses, Nene went to the police and withdrew the alibi, before making plans to go and stay in a retreat in the Blue Mountains, where she could receive treatment for her problems.