As I was growing up, I continued to pick around on the piano. Occasionally, my mom would start giving me lessons, but I never stuck with them for very long. I wasn’t disciplined enough to stick with practicing the easy songs that were necessary to develop skills needed to play more complicated music. When I was sitting at the piano, I was more likely to experiment with doing things that sounded more like a real song.
At some point, I discovered that I could play a bass note with my left hand and play a chord with my right hand. Playing these with the right rhythm, I could even accompany myself singing. I started doing this more and more. It would be years before I figured out how to add a melody any other way except singing.