I liked a lot of the things other people liked - Jimi Hendrix The Beatles Van Halen AC/DC - but if I compared it to my dad's music there just seemed to be elements missing.

I was 35 years old and in a position to take a shot at whatever I wanted to try. The Air Force said I was too old to fly fighter jets. I thought about becoming a fishing boat captain before deciding that acting seemed pretty cool.

Robert De Niro... It seemed like a pretty cool thing to do to put his name on my resume next.

So a more sensible thing it seemed to me was to go to Silicon Valley and be pushing on the technology companies to accelerate the use of audio and music in computers.

It took me so many years to move out. I'm definitely a bit of a Peter Pan reluctant to grow up. It all seemed really nice at home-why change it? Part of me would prefer not to have any responsibility whatsoever.

For a change lady luck seemed to be smiling on me. Then again maybe the fickle wench was just lulling me into a false sense of security while she reached for a rock.

It just seemed too weird to me. I don't know maybe they were smoking a joint in the car downstairs from their parents' apartment. I had to go that far to put together a scenario of how they could have possibly recognized me.

Mickey Mouse popped out of my mind onto a drawing pad 20 years ago on a train ride from Manhattan to Hollywood at a time when business fortunes of my brother Roy and myself were at lowest ebb and disaster seemed right around the corner.

Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.

I saw Richard Linklater's film 'Slacker' for my twenty-first birthday. That was the moment when it all seemed possible. This guy gave me hope.