Last season’s finale of “How I Met Your Mother” finally answered the lingering question of who exactly is the mother of the TV series’ title.

    The show’s main character, Ted Mosby, played by Josh Radnor and voiced in narration by Bob Saget, has spent eight seasons telling his kids the story of how he met their mom, endlessly dragging out the eventual interaction. Finally, creators Carter Bays and Craig Thomas revealed the mother’s identity: She is played by Cristin Milioti.

    The CBS show will enter its ninth and final season on September 23, with an hour-long episode, giving one last chance to play out the stories of Ted and his friends before — we hope — seeing him happily settle down.

    The creators, episode director and producer Pam Fryman and cast members Radnor, Neil Patrick Harris (Barney Stinson), Cobie Smulders (Robin Scherbatsky), Alyson Hannigan (Lily Aldrin) and Jason Segel (Marshall Eriksen) teased the upcoming 24-episode season recently at the San Diego Comic-Con.

    During a panel on the show, the creators unveiled a clip that explains why Ted’s children have been sitting on a couch listening to him tell this never-ending saga*.

    It ties in with something to come later in the season involving the kids, which Bays said they shot during the second season for whenever the ending arrived.

    “We thought we’d be done after eight seasons,” Bays told CNN.com after the panel, “so season nine is a bonus year and it’s the Wild West. Anything could happen. We’re changing a lot of the rules about how we thought we’d tell the story.”(SD-Agencies)