"None of us knew what we were doing," says Perry. "We figured it out step by step. Rent a studio, find good voices and an arranger, and put your financial life on the line and hope you recover the money. The amounts (of money) were scary."

Prime Recording has become a fairly lucrative operation, collecting royalties and selling songbooks, sheet music and CDs, some of them recorded in Japanese, Spanish and Korean. Eventually, they had to move because the business outgrew their house. There were stacks of sheet music, records and cassette tapes in the hallway and filling two rooms in the basement.

"Besides the songs she has recorded, there are many more that haven't been published," says John. "There's a drawer full of them."

Perry works in an office at the back end of the house, while John and Doug work in an office at the front of the house. She writes lyrics and notes in pencil and gives them to Doug, who prepares them for publication. Moody, among others, credits Doug for Janice Kapp Perry's commercial success. Those who know the couple believe Janice is too mild and modest to have promoted her own work.

"Doug believed in her work and made sure it was published," says Moody. "He is a driven man and a hard worker."

John now oversees the day-to-day operations, handling promotion, distribution, inventory, artwork and printing. The other children have ties to the business, as well. Steve is a full-time songwriter and playwright, with 11 albums of original music. Lynn is a songwriter, with one album to her credit. Robert is a graphic art designer who has done artwork for the family business.

"It's something I never anticipated," says Doug of the success of the music. "In some ways we're like Dorothy and Toto. We got picked up by the tornado and it carried us with it."

"Nobody's more surprised than I am by what's happened," says Perry. "You go to other countries and it (the music) is there. I wonder, how did it get there?"

Perry once lamented that she didn't begin writing sooner, but Doug told her the early years served as research for her music. There were children to rear, the heartbreak of a lost child, the joys and worries of day-to-day living, and her own personal trials.

The pain and paralysis began shortly after she began writing music. There was something wrong with her left hand. At first she couldn't control her index finger. Then the middle three fingers and the wrist curled downward, and she couldn't hold her hand in a normal position for playing the piano. There was a painful, burning sensation running from her forearm up to her shoulder and neck when she played the piano.