I DO listen to the words...to me that is the most important part of a song and as a lot of the singers I like are singing unaccompanied that makes sense. About sixty years ago I studied piano - got up to grade six, but then stopped, now I can play the right hand melody but have totally forgotten how to read the left hand for chords. I have played melodeon for about 40 years and learned hundreds of tunes by ear, I never bothered to learn to play from the dots - consequently I'm very quick at picking up tunes to join in with in sessions. I also have an excellent memory for song words ..I sometimes surprise my wife by singing something as we drive along and she'll say "'I've never heard you sing that one before" and I'll perhaps work it out that it's been lying dormant in my brain for thirty or so years...but still all there - maybe minus a few words - but as I sing it a few times they gradually come back. I was a resident singer in several folk clubs from 1963 onwards, so one tends to learn a huge number of songs to avoid boring the audience - as well as for the pleasure of singing them!