Thomas Ashford Jr. was born in Baltimore, MD to Thomas and Jordan Ashford. His godfather was his father's best friend, Shawn Butler. Sadly, T.J. was just a baby when he lost his father Thomas Sr. to a friendly fire incident, while Thomas Sr. had been serving in the Marines. Adding to the tragedy was the revelation that Shawn Butler had fired the fatal shot. As T.J. grew older, he began to act out and find trouble. When he was fourteen, his mother gave T.J. an ultimatum: move in with Shawn or go to military school. Reluctantly, T.J. opted to move to Port Charles.

On January 17, 2012, T.J. hitchhiked from Baltimore to Port Charles. It wasn't long before T.J. picked up where he had left off in Baltimore by breaking into Kelly's diner and helping himself to food. Shawn, who lived above the diner, was stunned to find his young godson in the diner after closing, but he was delighted to be reunited with T.J. T.J. reminded Shawn that Shawn had killed T.J.'s father. Just then, Shawn's therapy dog, Wilson, trotted up to Shawn. T.J. instantly softened.

Shawn agreed to let T.J. move in, and he enrolled T.J. in in the same high school as Molly Lansing. Molly had suffered a trauma that had led to post-traumatic stress, and Shawn had recognized the signs. The two had developed an unlikely friendship, that had instantly extended to Shawn's rebellious godson when Molly met had T.J. She had offered to help T.J. out with his studies if he needed it, but he made it clear that he wasn't interested in school.

Two days after arriving in Port Charles, T.J. stole a car and went joyriding. Mac Scorpio dropped the charges, but he made it clear that T.J. had better not get in trouble again. Shawn set some firm ground rules for T.J. as long as T.J. lived under Shawn's roof. T.J. was aware that Shawn worked for mobster Sonny Corinthos, so he resented Shawn's double standards. However, he agreed to respect Shawn's wishes to avoid being shipped off to military school.

T.J. quickly broke that promise. On February 7, Carly informed Shawn that T.J. had been posing as an employee at Metro Court then charging guests a "handling fee" for helping them with their luggage. T.J. offered Carly a cut of the money, but Shawn was not amused. A few days later, T.J. saw a golden opportunity to have some fun when he found out that Molly would have the house to herself. He used his MyFace account to announce a party at Molly's house, while Alexis was at a benefit.

On February 16, Molly was home alone and checked the MyFace account that T.J. had set up for her when T.J. knocked on her door. "Am I the first?" he asked. Molly had no idea what he was talking about until a horde of teens arrived. Molly was shocked when she saw them carrying in beer and snacks. The party quickly got out of hand, so Molly called her cousin, Michael Corinthos, to help break things up. While she waited, a girl handed Molly a spiked drink that she had assured Molly was "just punch." Before long, Molly was drunk, and T.J. had found himself in a physical altercation with one of the partygoers.

Michael arrived, and the party ended. Alexis was furious at what had transpired, and she forbid Molly from hanging out with T.J. However, Molly was an incurable romantic and drawn to the underdog. Molly forgave T.J., and a romance blossomed between the two. In time, Alexis found out, but Shawn intervened on T.J. and Molly's behalf, and he convinced Alexis to allow the teens to spend supervised time together.

In August, people started falling ill and dying because of a deadly pathogen that Jerry Jacks had placed in the town's water supply. Jerry offered an antidote in exchange for a price, but T.J. and Molly fell ill with fevers. T.J. was reluctant to call his mother, and Molly admitted that she felt the same about calling her father who lived in Los Angeles. Instead, they each wrote a bucket list of the things that they would like to do before they died then shared it with each other. Both had written that they would like to make love for the first time.

T.J. and Molly decided against having sex, and they both recovered from the deadly virus because a group of citizens had banded together to defeat Jerry. T.J. and Molly's relationship flourished.

However, in February 2013, T.J. found himself competing for Molly's attention when a teen named Rafe Kovich Jr. appeared in town. Rafe was a troubled young man who had been falsely accused of murdering his mother. T.J. and Rafe did not get along, and the two engaged in several altercations. Adding to the tension, was the appearance of Taylor Dubois. Taylor had a crush on T.J., and she never missed an opportunity to take advantage of the friction between T.J. and Molly.

In June, Molly was crushed when T.J. invited Taylor to the prom. Taylor was delighted, but T.J.'s thoughts were on Molly on the night of the prom. Taylor decided to take matters into her own hands, and she arranged for T.J. to see Molly and Rafe in the park together. T.J. became upset when he saw Rafe kiss Molly. After they left the park, T.J. got drunk and lost his virginity to Taylor. Taylor made certain that Molly was one of the first people to know about T.J. and Taylor's sexual relationship.

Unfortunately for Taylor, T.J.'s heart belonged to Molly. Despite both Taylor and Rafe's best efforts, T.J. and Molly found their way back to each other. Taylor left town brokenhearted.

Despite Shawn's best efforts, his life as a mob enforcer repeatedly touched T.J. On December 19, T.J. was kidnapped and held hostage by Carlos Rivera as a pawn in the war between the Corinthos and Jerome crime families. Shawn realized that it was time to let T.J.'s mother know the situation because T.J. would be safer with her. Meanwhile, T.J. and Molly were ready to take their relationship to the next level, but Alexis got wind of their plans. Alexis stopped things before Molly lost her virginity, prompting Molly to move in with her less controlling father who had recently moved back to town.

On March 14, 2014, Jordan Ashford arrived in Port Charles to fetch her son. T.J. was happy to see his mother until he learned the reason for her visit. He reminded his mother that she had sent him to live with Shawn, but Jordan insisted that she had sent T.J. to live with a man who ran a diner not someone who worked for the mafia. T.J. insisted that he couldn't leave because he was in the middle of his last semester of high school, and he had applied to Port Charles University. T.J. also made it clear that he would not leave Molly.

Jordan decided to remain in Port Charles. She tried to make up for the time she had lost with T.J., but tensions were high between Shawn and Jordan because Jordan had taken a job with mobster Ava Jerome at the Jerome Art Gallery. In May, Jordan bought T.J. a car as a graduation gift, but she was arrested, along with Julian Jerome and several other Jerome associates, several days later.

On May 21, Shawn revealed to T.J. that Jordan had sent T.J. to live with him because she had been convicted of drug trafficking and sentenced to two years in jail. Next, Shawn broke the news about Jordan's recent arrest with Julian Jerome. T.J. refused to believe that his mother had done anything illegal, and he lashed out at Shawn for not doing more to protect Jordan from being swept up in a sting. However, T.J. realized that Shawn had told him the truth when he confronted his mother at the scene of the crime.

In June, evidence emerged pointing to Molly's father as the head of the Jerome organization, and he was arrested. Ric Lansing proclaimed his innocence, and Molly stood by her father. T.J. worried that Molly would get hurt, but Molly insisted that her father and T.J.'s mother's situations were very different. T.J. conceded that she had a point.

On June 11, T.J. had an encounter with Rafe in the park. He was shocked when he saw Rafe snorting cocaine. The two traded heated words until Rafe sucker punched T.J. T.J. was knocked to the ground, but he stood up and invited Rafe to try again, but Rafe immediately backed down. The following day, Ric was killed in a hit as he was being transferred to prison. Molly was devastated, and T.J. focused on her.

A few weeks later, Rafe and Molly were involved in a car accident as Rafe fled the police. He had confessed to Molly that he had caused the accident that had killed Patrick Drake and Sabrina Santiago's son. Rafe died from his injuries, and tests later revealed that he had had heroin in his system at the time of the accident. T.J. was Molly's support system, and the two grew closer.

In November, Shawn and Jordan had a brush with Franco, an ex-serial killer. They escaped the encounter, and T.J. was relieved that his mother hadn't been harmed. Jordan decided that it was time to be honest with her son, so she and Shawn sat down with T.J. They explained that Thomas Sr. had learned about Jordan's past affair with Shawn on the day that Thomas Sr. had died. T.J. felt betrayed that Shawn had been unfaithful with his best friend's wife, but Jordan revealed that she and Thomas had gone through a difficult period because Thomas had been deployed overseas for a year.

Jordan admitted that she had turned to Shawn in her loneliness. T.J. realized that Shawn might be his father. They admitted that they had worried about the same thing, which had prompted them to do a DNA test. Thomas Sr. had found the letter from Jordan informing Shawn that Thomas Sr. was T.J.'s father, and Thomas Sr. had been in a rage when he had confronted Shawn, and Shawn had fired in self-defense. Moments after the shooting, the regiment had been attacked, and everyone had assumed that Thomas Sr. had been killed by friendly fire during the skirmish.

Shawn explained that he had kept quiet about the truth because he hadn't wanted one moment of anger to overshadow all the good that Thomas Sr. had done. It took T.J. time, but he made peace with his father's death, and Jordan and Shawn's role in it. The following month, it was revealed that Molly's father, Ric, had staged his death to draw out the real head of the Jerome organization. Molly was overjoyed, and T.J. returned his focus back to his studies. T.J. had been accepted to Port Charles University, and he had decided to pursue a career in medicine.

On May 20, 2015, T.J.'s life took an unexpected turn when Jordan was revealed to be an undercover agent working for the Drug Enforcement Agency then the Port Charles Police Department. Shawn had been sent to kill a man known as Jake Doe, but things had gone wrong, and Jordan had been forced to arrest Shawn. Shawn was horrified when he learned that his friend Hayden Barnes had been shot in the head.

T.J. was stunned when Jordan revealed that her conviction and prison sentence had been a part of her cover to lay the groundwork for her to infiltrate the Jerome organization. T.J. was hurt that Jordan hadn't told him about her work, but she explained that her hands had been tied. He was also angry that she hadn't been able to shield Shawn. Shawn had opted to plead guilty, and he was sent to Pentonville.

On June 10, 2015, T.J. was arrested. He refused to discuss his arrest with his mother. Instead, he waited until Ric arrived. T.J. had been on his way to visit Shawn at Pentonville, but he had stopped by Wyndham's Department Store to pick up a graduation gift for Molly. The security guard had jumped to several erroneous conclusions then he had tried to question T.J. about the credit card that T.J. had used. Things had escalated when T.J. had tried to leave, and the security guard had attempted to physically detain T.J.

Detective Dante Falconeri explained that the security guard had been injured in the scuffle, and he had decided to press charges against T.J. Unfortunately for T.J., Mayor Lomax had ordered Dante and Jordan to process the charges because she didn't want the police department to be accused of showing the new police commissioner's son special treatment. Ultimately, Sonny Corinthos intervened on T.J.'s behalf and paid the security guard a tidy sum of money in exchange for dropping the charges.

In September, T.J. was kidnapped and held captive in a warehouse as bait for Sonny Corinthos. Jason Morgan and Sam McCall were able to save T.J. and Sonny from certain death. In early December, T.J.'s father's younger brother, Curtis Ashford, appeared in Port Charles.

On February 12, 2016, T.J. was surprised when Molly invited him back to her dorm. T.J. didn't want Molly to feel pressured about making love, but she assured him that she was ready. During this time, T.J.'s relationship with his mother improved, with a little help from his uncle.

On June 16, T.J. celebrated being hired at General Hospital as an intern. He also invited Molly to move in with him, and she had happily accepted. T.J. decided to share the news with his mother in person, while Molly told Ric, so T.J. went to Jordan's office. However, he stopped outside the door when he overheard Curtis and Jordan talking about Thomas Sr.

Curtis had been filled with remorse because he had told his brother about Jordan's affair with Shawn. Curtis assured Jordan that he would never reveal that Shawn was T.J.'s father. A couple of weeks later, T.J. confronted his mother about his paternity. Shocked, Jordan explained that she had only been looking out for T.J. Disgusted, T.J. stormed out, but he ran into his uncle at Metro Court Restaurant. Curtis urged T.J. to give Jordan tell her side of things, but T.J. wondered if Shawn knew the truth.

In time, Jordan made T.J. understand that she had made poor choices with the best of intentions. Jordan admitted that Shawn had learned the truth about T.J. right before Shawn had been sent to prison, and that he had asked her not to tell T.J. the truth because Shawn had hoped to spare T.J. the pain of having a father in prison. In time, T.J. made peace with both Jordan and Shawn.

T.J. and Molly found a little apartment in the Charles Street district, and Molly focused on her studies, while T.J. interned at the hospital. T.J. was surprised when Jordan and Curtis began to date, but he grew to accept the relationship because he could see that they made each other happy.

In June 2017, T.J.'s great aunt Stella Henry arrived in Port Charles for a visit. She didn't hide her disdain for her nephew Thomas Sr.'s widow, but she was thrilled to be reunited with both Curtis and T.J. However, Stella grew concerned when she learned about Curtis and Jordan's relationship. Stella promptly changed her plans and took a job at General Hospital working as a social worker, and she moved into the Charles Street district near where T.J. and Molly lived.

T.J. loved his aunt, and he tried his best not to pick sides between his aunt and his mother. Stella and Jordan made an effort to shield him as much as possible, but there were moments when both Curtis sand T.J. had to back Jordan up, especially when Molly inadvertently revealed that Shawn was T.J.'s biological father. Stella loved T.J. regardless, and she made it clear that he would always be her nephew, but the betrayal was one more transgression for Stella to hold against Jordan.

When Curtis and Jordan decided to get married, Stella made it clear that she would not attend the wedding. T.J. tried his best to get through to his aunt, but Stella stubbornly held firm. In the end, T.J. sided with his mother, but he was delighted when Stella had a change of heart at the last minute. Stella entered the church and gave both Curtis and Jordan her blessings.

On February 22, 2018, Jordan was gravely injured when she was struck by a car. T.J. and Molly raced to her side, and they sat with Curtis at Jordan's bedside. Jordan underwent emergency surgery, but the damage to her kidneys had been extensive, and doctors determined that Jordan was in need of a lifesaving kidney transplant. T.J. and the rest of the family, as well as friends, were tested, but only Kevin Collins proved to be a match. Unfortunately, Kevin had an underlying medical condition that had ruled him out as a kidney donor.

Jordan underwent daily dialysis, but her health continued to decline. As a medical professional, T.J. understood how dire his mother's situation was. He stayed close to his mother, while he worked long hours at the hospital.