Born in Columbus, Ohio as Carolyn Louise Kramer to Warren A. and Ann (nee Caldwell) Kramer, when she was 18 months old her mother died unexpectedly. She was raised by her grandparents, Frank and Louise (nee Orton) Caldwell of Columbus.

She attended the Ohio State University Laboratory School in Columbus and was graduated from MacDuffie School in Springfield, Massachusetts. As a freshman at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, she met Rod Serling, a returning World War II veteran attending the college. They wed two years later, on July 31, 1948, and graduated in 1950 before moving to Cincinnati, where Rod worked for a local radio station.