April 1, 2001

Hi Rose, please tell Kelly to check out www.MamboMamas.com just so she'll know she isn't the ONLY big chick out there dancing! Next, she'll just HAVE to move to New York!!! NO group classes in Alabama??? How can you survive in such an environment? I couldn't afford to take privates either! However, until she gains some confidence, I know this might sound weird, but find a gay guy to take lessons with. They're the BEST friends, they don't care if you're fat and they don't want anything from you. Believe it or not I came into the salsa world through hanging at gay Spanish clubs. It was a gay guy who started bringing me to straight clubs 'cuz HE thought I shouldn't ALWAYS be hanging out with just gay guys. For a long time I would ONLY go to a straight club if he was with me. Eventually, he introduced me to all the dancers, made sure I knew everyone and felt comfortable. After that I started taking classes, met a lot of people there and as my dancing got better, my confidence grew. Just be careful not to turn into a bonafide fag hag! I know I would've married my friend Manny in a hot minute if he hadn't died. He was the nicest man I'd ever known and I told him all the time that I didn't care that he was gay. So that's my REAL story of how I started dancing salsa. Now I have my own dance company and perform all over the world. Life's strange, isn't it? Hope this helped. Abbey, THEmambomama