The year was 1994 and I was 11yrs old. My family at the time was being tested in a huge way. Dad for the first time was without a second job with a salary fit for a bachelor with no responsibilities. Mommy was working at a temp agency. They were doing their best but often times their best meant a can of lima beans for dinner shared among 5. Cool thing is I had no clue we were poor. I knew we were broke but I didn’t think we were poor because we were so happy. We had a lot of fun and a lot of joy. We were living in Cleveland, OH where I was born and partly raised. However we would often visit my Aunt Rhonda who lived in Washington,DC at the time. Yep the home of Tanya Blount who would later become Tanya Trotter of course. Her church had this amazing youth ministry called S.T.Y.T.C. (Saving Todays Youth Tomorrows Church) and they were preparing for a performance at the Cheverly Public Playhouse in Landover, MD and they were looking to premier a soloist. She told the director that she had a nephew visiting from Cleveland who could sing. I auditioned the sabbath (we were Seventh Day Adventist) before the performance at Bladensburg SDA church. Apparently I succeeded because they added me to the show. I sang and got a standing ovation. When you look at this clip of course you’ll hear me attempting to sing lol but you’ll also notice my suit and shoes being extremely too big for me. That’s because the clothes I’m wearing belong to my Dad. He’s 6ft 4in and weighed about 245lbs. His clothes always fascinated me but my clothes were boring so I begged him to let me wear his suit and shoes. So don’t judge us lol! Here’s a clip of the actual performance. I hope you enjoy Come see us this weekend too. Shows on the website. Just click the link in the bio section