When I was 7, Mom went into partnership with a Mrs. ^(@&$ in a downtown Tulsa dressmaking shop. I had to get up at 6:30, dress, breakfast, then sit outside the gate of the school until it opened, so Mom could go to work.

But this had it's benefits. Mom bought me a Navy bugle. I learn 30 or more bugle calls, and, over the years, played "To the Colors" for raising the flag in the morning, and "Taps" for lowering it at night. (Later, I played the trumpet in a marching band.)

Also, to keep me busy, Mom "got me Expression Lessons" with Mrs. Kimball. I easily memorized many "recitations". Among my appearances were on the Saturday Morning Kid Show on the radio. I also performed in some plays.

My main activity was in a "Minstrel Show" -- a little Al Jolson. (Don't blame me. I didn't know this was Jim Crow.) I was one of the two "End-Men". Telling jokes to "Mr. Interlocutor"; singing songs; dancing -- in a colorful costume, with frizzled fright-wig, and balckened face. We performed in my theaters in Tulsa and towns there about. And at "Old Men's banquets" and such.

My theater career ended two years later, when Mom dragged me off to live with her Clan in Springfield, MO. But I also performed in "class plays" in Junior and Senior High.

One bonus of this is a kind of sensitivity to acting performances. I seem to sense how most actors are going to respond to a situation. And that makes the suprises even greater. When Lawrence Olivier or Alec Guiness or Jack Nicholson or Ruth Gordon or Colleen Dewhurst do the unexpected, it takes my breath away!