August 2004 Featured User

SoCalChelle

Tale of a Tormented VH Fan

    
August 9, 1964, I was born (that means she's 24, in case you're trying to figure it out, Steve... -- ) in Pomona, California. I’m an only child, and so are both of my parents....no brothers or sisters, no 1st cousins, no aunts or uncles. Just me and my parents (and my mom’s parents across the street). We were the only white family in a mostly Hispanic neighborhood, and we lived there until I was 11, so that’s probably where I developed my love for Mexican food. I went to Christian school for kindergarten through 6th grade.
  
Even though I lived in a pretty bad neighborhood, I led a really sheltered life...so I didn’t know how bad it was. The neighbor kids all went to public school and had their share of troubles there, but they came home afterwards and played nice with me, so I never really knew what they were going through (until later.) I started playing guitar when I was 10...got a $10 nylon stringed monstrosity from Sears cuz my parents didn’t want to spend a lot of money on something they figured would end up in the closet collecting dust. I took guitar lessons for a little while, but never really did learn how to read music that well. Kept snapping the neck of that cheap ass guitar when I’d put steel strings on it. Musta glued it back on about 20 times.
When I was 11, we moved to a “better neighborhood.” I left my sheltered existence at Christian school and moved on to public school for Junior High. Talk about culture shock! LOL! Even though we were technically living in a better neighborhood, this is where I made up for lost time and was thoroughly corrupted. I quickly discovered “sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll.” I was into KISS, Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin and also all the teen heartthrobs like Leif Garrett, Shawn and David Cassidy, etc. See how many of my teen idols you can spot in this pic.   

I’d bought myself a better guitar and given up lessons in favor of just kinda figuring it out for myself. By the time I was 14, I could (and did) play just about anything after listening to it a few times (or a few hundred, depending on the song). My friends would bring over their latest album, point out their favorite song and ask me if I could play it. I’d tell them to give me a couple days.


One day, someone (I don’t even remember who) brought over an album by this new group called Van Halen. They said, “Don’t even try to play Eruption, you might hurt yourself.” Hmmmm.....I thought, it’s only a minute and a half long....how hard could it be? I waited until my parents went out for the night, put the album on their good stereo and cranked it up. I sat there with my guitar in my hands and my chin on the floor, in dumbstruck amazement at what I was hearing. (By the way, I still have the same reaction any time anyone plays Eruption, but especially Eddie. That solo has never ceased to amaze me.) I listened to that entire album at least twice all the way through. I then put my guitar in the closet in disgust (because I knew I’d never be able to play that well) and didn’t touch it again until just recently (so I guess my parents were right about it ending up collecting dust after all - haha.) I was hooked on Van Halen for good. On any given evening from 1978 until I got married in 1982, you’d be likely to hear my mom banging on my bedroom door screaming, “TURN THAT SHIT DOWN!!!” Anyways, time went on, I grew up, got married, had kids, got unmarried.....things got bad before they got better and then I finally found my path in life. A lot of time went by, during which I was doing the single mom thing and trying to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up. Through it all, I was still a Van Halen fan. I was heartbroken when Dave left the band because I’d never seen them together in concert. But I revelled in Dave’s solo career and yes, I’ll admit it, I was happy when I heard Sammy was joining VH. I’d liked him as a solo artist and was just damn happy that I’d still have the chance to see Eddie play live. I saw VH at least once on every tour after that (except for with Gary.) And as they say, the more things change the more they stay the same. On any given evening from 1992, when my marriage ended, to the present day, you’d be likely to hear one or both of my kids banging on my bedroom door screaming, “TURN THAT SHIT DOWN!!!”

I didn’t get into the internet scene until early ’99, but the first thing I went searching for was info on VH. I found their official site, started talking online to their webmaster, Brad Starks. Somehow, a year later, I found myself as a moderator on their now defunct message board, The Pleasure Dome. That was a great place to hang out...some of the funniest people on the face of the earth are Van Halen fans...and, when it shut down, I wanted a place to carry on that tradition. A place where the Van Halen fans (whether they liked Dave, Sammy or even Gary) could just talk about whatever Van Halen fans like to talk about, without being flamed for their trouble. That’s how this site was born. It started out as a free site on ezboard and has grown from there. In the past few years, I’ve been lucky enough to meet in person....Brad Starks, Ralph Saenz, Joe Lester, Scott Patterson, Russ Parrish, Michael & Sue Anthony, Kevin Dugan, Nuno Bettancourt, Eddie Van Halen, Brian Young, Ray Luzier, James Lomenzo, Toshi Hikeda, David Lee Roth....whew, the list goes on and on. Ever since I was 14, I’ve been in love with Eddie and in lust with Dave. If you’d told me then that someday I was going to meet BOTH of them, I woulda said you were crazy. It’s been a wild ride so far.....I can’t wait to see what happens next.