At several points in the storyline, the NPCs make reference to the forgotten heroes, and it seemed to me that the game was implying that my character WAS among those heroes, and has either been inflicted with the same amnesia about it as everyone else, or is keeping silent about her involvement.

Perhaps for Legacy characters, the connection is made more explicit, but that was the impression that I got: that my character is one of the forgotten ones. I may have been reading too much into it, though.