Meldanyel was born in Staddle and has spent most of her life in the land of Bree.  

Her father, Bert, was a farmer, a native of Combe, and in winter, when the harvest was already harvested and ready for the next season, her father did other work to earn a few extra coins. 

Her mother, Leofwen, was from Dale, coming from a large merchant family. She had fallen in love with and married Bert, settling in Staddle and selling the produce her husband produced at the market, but she always missed the life of the wandering merchant and tried to pass on the lust for the road to her daughter.

Although they had started with some money, a couple of bad harvests had caused them to lose much of their fortune. Overall, they were quite poor, but they had enough to get by. And Meldanyel lived happily despite the lack of money, with a family that loved and cared for her. 

Unfortunately, when she was a teenager, her father was attacked by a spider of enormous size and although he survived the encounter, the venom that ran through his veins killed him. They could have tried to cure him, but the antidotes were very expensive and the ones they could afford were of little use. 

Alone, she and her mother had to work hard to support themselves.Meldanyel continued to farm the land and always accompanied her mother to the market, learning the art of the trade, though she never became as good as Leofwen.

Little by little they saved, until they had a few coins.Leofwen, very determined, told her daughter that the only way out of poverty was to try to trade in goods from outside the lands of Bree, to become travelling merchants.  With the money they had, they made an investment and went to Ered Luin, in search of the famous elven drinks that they thought would be successful in Bree. 

But her mother never returned. Meldanyel heard from her months later, when at last a dwarven merchant arrived and informed her that the caravan they were traveling in had been attacked by orcs and only he had survived. Out of sympathy, the dwarf gave her a few coins and what he had been able to recover of Leofwen's personal effects.

Since then Meldanyel has been alone, but she is not a pessimistic character or one to give up easily. For now she is only thinking of surviving, but she wants to fulfill her mother's dream of becoming a respected merchant.