Uncle Dave, you said:
"I guess, from looking at my last post, the upshot is that the pleasure is for me is basically in the act of communication. Whether it's with one listener or three hundred, as I say, makes some difference, but not much.
..."

Well, a lot of us have had the experience of playing somewhere for an audience of only 1 to 3 people. And if you're a true artist/performer, you give that tiny audience as much of yourself as you would a full house.

But, as Bo Bice, a rock/blues/funk musician, pointed out recently, "When you have only a couple people in the audience, the mosh pit gets pretty tricky. You have to have really good aim."
§;-D