I still remember the first time I heard about MMMBop: I was in the car with my (now ex) boyfriend and my friend Chelsea. WE were listening to a Spice Girls song, I think, when Chelsea said, "Have you heard that song by, like, the New Girls, or something like that?" Having no idea what she was talking about, I shook my head, and then changed the radio station. Lo and Behold, Chelsea says, "This is it! This is the song I was just talking about!" I think she was pleased with herself and her "psychic powers." I didn't really listen to the words, just nodded along.
That was March of 1997.
Eventually we learned that the band's name was Hanson, not the New Girls. Their song was number 1 on our local countdown every night for 2 months. By May, they were number one on the national countdown as well. I bought the single. My friend Carrie and I made up a dance to MMMBop. I remember having it in my head constantly, and singing it at the school play. Hearing it at King's Dominion while I was on the roller coaster. That June, the day after school let out, I bought the cd, because my friend told me it was good.
The bad thing about school letting out was I never got to see my friends anymore: they all left to beach houses, vacations in Jamaica, or relative's houses. On top of that, I was babysitting my sisters Brooke and Ashleigh every day while my mother took classes to get her master's degree. Needless to say, I was bored out of my mind.
The two consolations I had were MTV and the Internet. I don't know when it was that I first saw the MMMBop video, but I remember it well. I was babysitting my sisters when Carson Daly's Top Ten Countdown came on, and who was number one but Hanson. I remember three specific things I said:
1."There is no way that five year old is playing the drums."
2. "Hey that girl has a Rachel haircut! Cool!"
3. "The oldest one is too ugly to be a girl. I think it's two girls and a guy."
It's funny when you consider how much I loved that video the second, third, and hundreth time I saw it. That June of 1997, my sisters and I took turns flipping from VH1 to MTV waiting for MMMBop to come on so we could watch it and giggle at the little one and the middle one bump into each other. By that time I knew they were boys and I also began to think that Zac was really, really adorable. This was largely because of the World Wide Web, and a short story that isn't even up anymore.
My family got our Internet connection the week before school let out, but I'd been to busy to use it. Refusing to play another round of Battleship with Brooke and Ashleigh, I decided to search the Internet. Yahoo staring me in the face, I drew a blank. So I asked my sister what I should search for. "I don't know….Hanson." she screamed.
So I did. There was a page with a fictional story about them, who I learned were named Taylor, Isaac, and Zachary. I didn't really care about them, but I liked the story so I bookmarked the page. I went on some more Hanson pages. The enthusiastic vibe (i.e. "Hanson rules!!! They are so hot!!!") was infectious. I logged off planning to visit the pages again.
As I said before, at first I really liked Zac. I cut and pasted pictures of him onto a document on Word titled "Zac." Eventually this was retitled just plain "Hanson" cause I began to put pictures of Taylor up also. In fact, I was beginning to REALLY like the middleman of Hanson. The document is still saved on Word. It's fifteen pages long.
Another thing I did on the Internet was go to the MMMBop chat room on L.A.'s Hanson page. [L.A. is a name of a girl, not the city L.A.'s Hanson page] I absolutely loved this chatroom. I became good friends with a girl named Kegler, and a guy named Ryan and we would meet there every night at 1:00 AM. We had so much fun. Most of our conversations didn't even have to do with Hanson: we talked abouted this annoying brat Samantha who was also ALWAYS there, and how Fuzzy and Moustik (the chat room couple) were doing.
One night none of the regulars who I had become friends with were there. I still wanted to hang out online however. So, I decided to log onto the chatroom not as my usual name "Dolphin" but as "Taylor" and fool some ppl. Everyone was like, "you're not Taylor Hanson!" but I insisted that I was, snickering to myself. They all bombarded "Taylor" with questions to quiz "him." Having an ability to remember pointless things, I knew their favorite colors, parent's names, and other stuff from varied websites. You could say I knew it all. I had everyone in their believing me, which was hilarious.
Then someone new logged on, named MMMBop. I was confused. I knew L.A. had reserved it so only the Hanson's could use that screen name. I don't know how, but she did. Something about the email addy. The first thing MMMBop said was, "that's not the real Taylor." Everyone was like, "Yeah, how do you know?" MMMBop typed in, "Cause I am."
I was skeptical of course. They all bombarded him with "quiz" questions, but he just said "I'm not answering questions; you'll all just have to trust me." I logged off, confused. Could this really be him?? I had a weird feeling it was. Or maybe I was just dreaming.
I logged back onto the chatroom as Dolphin, and privately questioned MMMBop how he was doing, not asking him pointless questions. I think that MMMBop was grateful someone wasn't being obnoxious, because he privately asked me why everyone was so insistent that he answer questions. MMMBop and I, whether he was really Taylor or not, had an awesome conversations. I mentioned I was blond also, and we teased each other with blond jokes.
That's the closest I've been with interacting with the Hansons.
Eventually MMMBop left the chatroom, saying good bye and he'd see me there another time. I sat back from the keyboard for the first time in 3 hours. That's how long we talked. I went up to my diary and wrote just about everything down. I couldn't believe my good luck.
I never talked to him again because two days later I went to CTY. By the end of the school year, some people had started to make fun of me because I liked Hanson. I hadn't really cared all that much, but it still hurt my feelings. At CTY no one cared. That is one of the reasons I believe that it is the greatest place in the world: they judge you for who you are, not the fact that you like a certain music group. I had a NANO baby which I named Taylor and no one gave a shit that it was named after one of the Hansons, we still had fun with it. In those 3 weeks I felt open to express how I felt about the three guys from Tulsa. Go to Part 2 of this essay
