God has taken care of me, and mother dear has taken care of me, too. All my life.

I go on stage with what God gave me - and that's a natural high. I don't need nothing to perk me up. The audience picks me up enough. That's the total God's truth.

In my relationship with a young guy I was going with in a band - his name was Sylvester, and I think he had another little girl on the side - I told him, 'If you lose me, you're going to lose a good thing.' And I went home and put that poem to music.

You'd always see a lady or a little girl sitting at a piano. I decided I wanted to play something more unexpected, so that's when I got interested in learning to play the guitar.

I decided that playing piano was a little bit too common, you know what I mean?

I really wish that I would have gone to college. Even my son, who's into rap himself, I tell him and tell his children, 'Go to college. Get that education - it is so important. Don't do like I did.' I had all this singing on my mind, and I just didn't have time for it.