Despite his troubled times in the later years of his life, Michael Jackson was undoubtedly a pioneer in his field and talented to the bone. His music and dancing captured the hearts of many people across the world, including the tubby 2-year-old Kylie who used to bob up and down to his music in Australia. Last night I watched his music videos on YouTube and around the web for two hours straight and all of these memories came flooding back. Everyone has an MJ story of some sort and I thought I’d share mine.

Do you remember how scary his Thriller music video was to you as a kid? It still freaked me out last night. Our neighbors in Sydney in the 1980s had this awesome hi-fi system (before the home theater system truly existed) and they would play Thriller all of time. Oh, the chills! My sister and two of the kids next door would perform little concerts and pretend we had thousands of fans in the audience. I was always a back-up singer with a hairbrush or white-out bottle as my microphone. Unfortunately I never got the “good” brush because I was the smallest kid. Also I couldn’t ever be in the den (where we rehearsed) alone when Thriller was playing nor could I look at MJ’s poster because I felt like his eyes followed me. But oh man, I loved his music.

My love for MJ’s music continued to grow and I even got to go to one of his concerts as a 16-year-old. I dragged two of my friends to his concert one night early. We sat down in our seats, 20 rows from the front, then were told to leave because we came on the wrong night. That’s just how excited I was to see him!

Music really brings worlds together and I know MJ’s talent will be missed. Man In The Mirror will always be one of my favorite songs but I also loved I’ll Be There, Billie Jean, The Way You Make Me Feel, and Will You Be There. Do you have a favorite song or MJ story?

Image credits: The talented Richard E. Aaron