Going to Nashville to meet the in-laws was the first time when I'd been in America and not been seen as some sort of eccentric character with a cute accent.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
If you had told me when I was starting out that I would be coming down to Nashville, kind of weaving in and out of the country scene, I never would've thought that in a million years.
There is definitely that thing here a little where people are like 'Oh that Broadway girl has come to Nashville' and I'm like 'Listen you guys, I was singing country before I even got a Broadway show. And I'm from Kentucky.'
One of the reasons I wanted to do a show about Nashville in Nashville was because when I lived here, the hardest thing to go out and hear was country music. Country was taking place inside the studio and it was an export.
I can only say the first thing that pops into my mind is I remember, years ago, seeing kind of a has-been country singer working - when I first moved to Nashville - in a bar in a Holiday Inn.
When I got to Nashville, people started asking me about how I got into country music. I'd tell them I came from a place where people wore cowboy hats for a real reason.
Nashville feels like a big little town to me. It's got lots of culture and lots of interesting things to do and lots of interesting people. At the same time, it feels very small and tight-knit and very close. Everyone feels like they know each other.
Being in Nashville was not me, and I needed to go home and reset before I got in over my head.
And to me, I had come out of Texas, and during that time was when I realized that a lot of people in Nashville, their idea of what country music was was not the same as mine.
Nashville is the place where I first realized how impossible it is to look at someone and know what is inside them, what special something they possess.
Nashville is wicked. It's like a proper music community, but it's also quintessentially American. You bump into people there with cowboy hats that spit in jars and call you 'boy.' I just love that.