Joe - you asked if there is any way for you to get something from standard notation. Refering again to my grandmother who, as I said couldn't read the music, what she would do is buy the sheet music, write out the notes of the melody as leters, ie. CDEFGAB...., and by playing the notes, work out the key. She would either leave it as that or convert them to Sol Fa so that she could play in different keys. Under these she would add chord markings, something akin to figured bass, but alas it was her own system and no-one can work it out.

This is why using a standard such as Sol-Fa would be of greater benefit to future generations than something we could devise ourselves.

Incidently, often-as-not Nan used no music at all and busked it.