Sorry for your loss; I'm sure she wants you to enjoy life and it sounds like you love cruising. I'm going to type the following for ANYONE in the OPs situation who desires to be social, the following is NOT directly addressing the OP
- On embarkation day, there's a singles meetup
- Try to have as many meals as possible at a shared table at the MDR
- Spend some time with the smokers; most smoking sections are outside
- Conversation DON'Ts, avoid politics/religion/s3x, talking for straight minutes, or endlessly asking questions without answering your questions
- Conversation DOs, while a conversation will generally start with small talk such as where are you from and what do you do for work, those may lead to long conversations but once that's out of the way, a good way to make a connection is to find out what brings a person joy and share what brings you joy. I'm much more likely to remember the "couple who loves tennis" than the "Nurse and Accountant from Ohio, couple"