I'm not sure I understand your question, but why not the following?
#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict;
use warnings;

my $string = 'data' x 20;

if ($string =~ m/data/) { 
    print "Matching '$&'", "\n";
}

print 'from $string which has value of ', "$string\n";

#Output:
#Matching 'data'
#from $string which has value of datadatadatadatadatadatadatadatadatad
+atadatadatadatadatadatadatadatadatadatadata

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In reply to Re: search one instance by d5e5
in thread search one instance by toniax

Title:
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