United Kingdom, April 7 -- James Van Der Beek realised his life was going to change when he saw his face on a billboard for the first time.

The 48-year-old actor played Dawson Leery on the hit teen drama 'Dawson's Creek' between 1998 and 2003, and James admits that the show totally changed his life.

Speaking at Steel City Con in Pittsburgh, James shared: "I made a movie when I was 17, and everybody said, 'Are you ready for this to change your life?' And I was like, 'Oh, yeah!' I remember going to that movie with my college friends, and there was only one other person in the theatre. I was like, 'I don't think this is going to change my life.' And it didn't at all.

"So when I was in 'Dawson's Creek', we were in North Carolina - we were ...