IT’S THE QUESTION on the nation’s lips: did New Orleans Rose MollyMolloy Gambel really say yes to the on-stage proposal from her boyfriend Kyle?

Well, despite saying “No, no, no, not here, no…” it appears she actually does want to marry him. “I’m so excited,” she said afterwards.

Here’s the proposal again, in case you’d forgotten how painful it was:

YouTube/rte

So what happened next? “I am fantastic, I am so on cloud 9,” MollyMolloy said on RTÉ radio this morning. “I just couldn’t believe that Kyle was so bold.”

And was she miffed at all? “It just shows his love for me.”

But why did she say no so many times?

I was not saying no to the proposal itself. I was just saying no to the idea, just no no no this wasn’t really happening.

Backstage immediately after That Moment, RTÉ Player interviewer Colm Flynn asked MollyMolloy’s new fiancé Kyle whether doing it live on stage at the Rose of Tralee might have been… a bit of a risk. Kyle said:

Me and her cousin and her dad were the three that knew about it beforehand. We had a few concerns…

And rightly so. He then bafflingly insisted:

It was an amazing moment for us.

which can only mean he hadn’t seen it on YouTube yet.

Meanwhile, MollyMolloy was weeping softly in the corner. But was she sad? Not one bit of it. “I’m just so excited,” she said.

Kyle also revealed that they met after he fell off a mechanical bull. Romantic. Here’s the interview in full:

YouTube/rte

Asked whether she’d have preferred a more… personal… proposal, MollyMolloy told RTÉ: “It was just so special. I wouldn’t want [my family] to find out any other way.”

Rose of Tralee hopeful gets proposed to… live on stage>

Rose of Tralee 2013: Night One as it happened>