One day, when I was seven or so, this guy came around the house from the local music school. My mom was hanging laundrey on the clothes line that went from the second story window to the garage in back. He came up the gangway between houses and hollered up something like: "You got any kids that want to learn an instrument?" My mom turned to me and asked if I wanted to play an instrument and I said "trombone", probably because my dad had one that he used to play. The guy said they didn't have a trombone teacher, but how about the trumpet. And that's how I happened to end up as a "child prodigy", playing trumpet in an orchestra with about 30 accordion players, and a drummer. The accordion players would set the tone on their accordions for the instrument whose part they were playing (flute, clarinet, trombone, etc.), and we'd play band arrangements of the popular songs of the day. It was all quite inspiring.

Years later, I borrowe my sister's Teisco DelRay electric guitar (from Sears and Roebuck) and I learned to play the chord diagrams in The Golden Beatle's Songbook. The first guitar I owned was a Danelectro Belzouki electric twelve string. Man I wish I still had that guitar. . .

Oh yeah, I now play harmonica on a rack. The theory being that by adding harmonica, my guitar playing is no longer the weakest part of my act.