This story is FICTION--Made-Up--FAKE.  I have never met Hanson.
I am simply using them as characters for this story.

 Chapter 3:  More, more, more!

 

 By the time her husband had arrived home from work the following day, Diana had heard the harmonization of “Amen” possibly several hundred times.   Ike and Taylor seemed to be caught up with the idea of making sound together.  To try to sidetrack them she put the batteries into the cassette player and plugged in one of tapes to the Life Time Collection of the Fifties music that they had brought with them.  The boys didn’t know the words to the old songs but they began to listen intently.  When Walker entered the house the usual stampede occurred but this time it was accompanied with pleads of “Teach us more Daddy!”

* * *
 Walkers excursion into the company warehouse had proven somewhat fruitful.  There were no bunk beds to be found.  The only crib available was the same one that they had returned.  He did find a large wicker trunk.  They removed the lid, and it made a very acceptable crib.  The only other thing that he discovered for his trouble was an old guitar with three missing strings.  Walker picked up the phone, called his father and had him ship several dozen guitar strings by Federal Express.  The package only took two weeks to arrive.
 

 The Hanson boys had found a new interest.  Everyday after they arrived home from school and had finished their schoolwork under the watchful eye of their mother, they crowded around the small cassette player and listened and sang along with the songs on the tapes.  Every evening after dinner, they listened attentively as their Dad and Mom taught them how to sing.  The two part harmonies were on pitch and crisp.  Ike and Taylor were interested in learning, Zac at three was too young to be interested.  He was more interested in his Ninja Turtle action figures.

 Before bedtime, Walker would take out the guitar and would entertain his family.  He and Diana would sing their favorites songs from when they had been members of a traveling gospel group “The Horizons” in college and other favorites if they could remember the words.

 Diana was very excited and pleased about her boys’ interest in music.  Music had been her major in college and now she would be able to pass it onto her children.  Also, the rainy season had started so she had to find something to keep them occupied.  The heavy downpours had turned the lot behind their small house into a mud pit so now the boys had to stay inside most of time.  In addition to the singing lessons, Ike was showing an interest in learning the note positions on the guitar.  But, his arms were so short that he couldn’t reach both the neck of the guitar with one hand while trying to strum the strings with the other.

 One day while Ike and Taylor were at school Diana unpacked a small battery operated keyboard that she had packed among their belongings.  Because of the limited weight alotment, she had left the baby stroller behind in order bring the keyboard.  Now, with a new interest in music she suspected that the boys would be more receptive to basic piano lessons.  It was more of a toy than a musical instrument, but it would be enough to teach them the basic scales.

 So with the knowledge of five basic keys, Ike began to learn piano scales.  Diana instructed him on the simple Happy Birthday song and left him to practice while she began to prepare dinner.  As wife and mother of four Diana was used to trying to deal with many tasks at once.  She heard the boys arguing, and then she heard the baby begin to cry but she couldn’t leave the skillet on the stove at that moment.  She yelled for Ike to pick up his sister and continued her task of trying to finish preparing a meal.
 Taylor appeared at the kitchen door with Jessica propped up on his hip.  “Mommy, Ike won’t let me play!” he complained.

 “Honey sit down with the baby, she’s too big for you to be carrying!’ Diana admonished and smiled as her pouting middle child sat down on the floor in the midle of the doorway.

 “You need to let Ike have his turn first because he’s older.” she explained.
 “That’s not fair.” Taylor complained.

 Diana handed her son a bottle and he stuck it into his sisters mouth.  “Ike always get to do stuff first cause he’s older and he’s always going to be older than me!” Taylor objected.

 “And, you always get to do stuff before Zac does because you’re older than him.” Diana explained softly.  “That’s the way it works.”    Taylor’s little eyebrows crunched up as he thought about that logic but he still wasn’t satisfied.  “It’s still not fair.”
 “Get used to it,” Diana warned.  “Otherwise you’re going to be a very unhappy person for a very long time.”
 

 “I don’t want be unhappy, Mommy.” Taylor answered somewhat confused by her answer.  ‘I just want Ike to get off the keyboard so I can play!”

Chapter Four...