I have no regrets. I have not one single regret. I was born with a wonderful DNA where I felt that my life was not a race against someone else or another artist. It was probably internal.

The interesting thing is that, well, here's what I think about songwriters and songs. Sometimes people sit down and say, "I gotta write a song today, I have a title" and all of that, and sometimes inspiration just happens, almost like "Sugar, Sugar" and a couple of the other songs. But basically, I just started playing the piano, and I'm not a great piano player.

I remember the day before my dad died, I was in a hospital room with him, and he had lived a long life. He was 94, and I helped him get up, and there were two windows separated by the partition. I took him to the first window, and he kind of found his way to the second window, and on the way there was a mirror, and he looked into it, and I saw through the corner of my eye, I remember the look on his face. What came over his face was "So I'm here. I've crossed that bridge."

With Kevin [Drew], as I said, in his own way just told me "You gotta find that person that talks to you in your songs." I think we succeeded. I feel relief, to be quite honest with you.

If you look at my history, I'm not gonna let that many people into whatever I'm going through.

I have no regrets. I have not one single regret. I was born with a wonderful DNA where I felt that my life was not a race against someone else or another artist. It was probably internal.

There are times when, for many years, I've been irrelevant - and it was OK! I had my moment. No one is responsible for anyone else's dreams. I don't need a babysitter. I just needed to know that I could do this. I just think that my happiest time or my best time, upon reflection, is that I had the courage to do this.