I WOULD like to think that as a baby in my cot at Taylors Arm I could hear the tones of Slim Dusty wafting over the mountain from 'Homewood', his family farm at Nulla Nulla Creek.
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But alas, it must have been the yodelling from the Taylors Arm Pub just down the road.
Because after a bit of research, Slim had left the farm before I was born.
As far as I know the Taylor's Arm Pub never ran out of grog, so Gordon Parsons got his facts wrong when he wrote 'the pub's got no beer'.
And as for 'I like to have a beer with Duncan', well even though I don't recall the pub being called The Town and Country, I would like to think Slim was having a beer at Taylors Arm, because it was only half-a-day's ride on horseback past Thumb Creek and Burrapine from Nulla Nulla.
The word Nulla Nulla is Aboriginal for hunting club.The only clubbing Slim did over a lifetime of touring was sing at just about every RSL, golf and bowling club in Australia.
My recollections could all be wrong, but, I am sure one night as I sucked on my dummy I heard Ringer in the Top End blowing through my bedroom window as a cooling sou-wester' wound its way over the mountain.
What a memory!
Imagine going off to sleep on a hot summer's night at the back of Taylors Arm when not only did a lovely cooling southerly change drop the temperature by 15 degrees, but also bought with it the wonderful sounds of Australia's greatest country music artist.
Maybe Slim was home for a break from his touring schedule?
My father Neville Clyde always talked about knowing Gordon Parsons, the writer of one of Slim's best known songs, The Pub with No Beer.
No doubt this friendship would have developed over a few cooling ales.
And I can assure you he wouldn't have been sitting on the verandah of the Taylors Arm establishment if it had no beer.
As for my mother Norma Eliza, she had a special place set aside on the settee in the lounge room. No one was allowed to sit where she had a cushion placed in memory of the afternoon she had a cup of tea and a piece of her exquisite fruit cake with none other than that Sheik of Scrubby Creek, Chad Morgan!
He's the bloke who was a timber cutter before he was called up to enlist in the Air Force where they made him the cook.
But it's that thought, that maybe I did hear Slim Dusty, as I drifted off to sleep, singing one of those quintessential Australian songs, that fills me with pride.
Perhaps The Rain Tumbles Down in July put me to sleep and remains entrenched in my subconscious.
And to think that he was just over the mountain.
But even today, although Slim's been gone for a few years now, he is still just over the mountain in my thoughts.
As for The Sheik from Scrubby Creek, Chad Morgan, another Hall of Famer, there was no funnier, first time performance on national radio than his appearance on the 1952 Australia's Amateur Hour hosted by Terry Dear.
As Chad reminds listeners, his full name was Chadwick and he came from Duckinwilla Creek not far from Maryborough.
And Gordon Parsons, song writer and performer who occasionally appeared on stage with Slim, was well known around the Valley.
Back then it was called country and western music and there were many travelling performers.
Like rap music today, yodelling was the big thing in those early years.
Strangely, Slim Dusty wasn't a great fan of the yodel. His wife, Joy McKean, and her sister, were great yodellers.
Known as the McKean sisters they would often accompany Slim with a yodelling extravaganza.
I don't believe the yodel was a big hit in Nambucca Heads. I remember one night at the appropriately named Nambucca School of Arts ... only two patrons turned up to watch a travelling country and western show which featured a well known yodeller.
Those two were my mother and I. Unfortunately the show was cancelled, we got our money back and headed off home, me wearing my cowboy gear, minus the gun and holster, and mum very disappointed that she didn't get to hear her favourite yodelling.
Slim Dusty's original travelling country band is no more but his genius lingers.
Chad Morgan is still with us and I am sure is still proclaiming to be The Sheik from Scrubby Creek.
And whoever is sitting on that treasured settee from the lounge room at Pilot St is not aware they are in the presence of Australian country music royalty.
Not that bloke from Newee Creek, but Chadwick from Duckinwilla Creek!