I first got interested in music as a toddler by my childhood babysitter, Rosetta Atkins. She taught me how to sing by imitating the voices on the gospel radio station she listened to - both men and women's voices.

By the time I was six or seven-years-old, I had learned several techniques of how to use my voice and was able to choose the sound I wanted to distinguish myself, so I started writing songs on the piano.

Eventually as a teenager, I was pulled up on stage by James Brown's saxophone player, Maceo Parker, during one of his concerts and scatted on his stage for 20 minutes. After I was done, Maceo's bass player got down on one knee as if he were proposing, took a string off of his bass guitar and coiled it up around my ring finger. He hushed the crowd and said into the microphone, "Wendy, from this day forward you are married to music. You have a gift from God. You must devote your life to using this gift or else you will deprive the world of something so special." I got the chills.

Knowing how to market yourself and your press materials is key.

Being in the music business requires having a very strong resolve. You must be completely committed to the craziness that will inevitably ensue when pursing a career in music. There is no one who is immune to this. Not even the biggest music icons.

Every artist that becomes famous has a team, and needs to convince someone to believe in them enough to have others rally around them to achieve stardom. If I can be that person, then I am happy to do it.

I have to say one of the lessons I learned is to always be prepared.