My mom has had an ongoing love affair with a man other than my father for over 60 years. His name is Frank Sinatra, and she first met him on the radio.

In the early ’40s, Sinatra hosted Your Hit Parade, a program sponsored by Lucky Strike Cigarettes that aired every Saturday night from 1935 to 1955. As a teen, Mom and her family would gather around the radio and listen to the weekly countdown of the top 15 songs, “tabulated by the best sellers of sheet music, phonograph records and most played on the automatic coin machines.” I can almost picture her as a young girl listening with the same dreamy-eyed look she still gets when she hears Sinatra’s voice; a voice that can erase decades with only a few notes.

I had my own love affair with the radio that started when my family lived in Malaysia in the late ’60s. My brother had some kind of pre-jambox portable version that picked up American stations so he could hear static-filled baseball games and not feel quite so far from home. And like any annoying 6-year-old little sister, it was my responsibility to mess with his belongings. So when he wasn’t around I’d drag the radio into the den and turn the dial until I found American music being broadcast. Those songs became my touchstone to a home half a world away.

Other than the string of Beatles hits that were all the rage with the older kids, I remember hearing Herb Alpert’s “This Guy’s in Love With You,” a version of the Alan and Marilyn Bergman-penned “Yellow Bird” by the Brothers Four, and Tom Jones’ “The Green, Green Grass of Home” which Mom would sing along to and cry.

During those two years overseas my family had a Malaysian amah (a sort of nanny and maid), Ying, who lived with us and took care of me. My world revolved around her, and the two of us spent a lot of time in front of that radio learning American songs and making up hand motions as we performed them for each other. One of our favorites was Petula Clark’s “Kiss Me Goodbye,” which was a hit in ’69 so we were guaranteed to hear it at least once a day. I remember when we were getting ready to move back to the States how hard it was to say goodbye to people who’d become part of our family, and whom we probably wouldn’t see again. Goodbye felt beyond words, especially for me and Ying. So instead, she pulled me aside and sang “Kiss Me Goodbye” in her broken English, doing the hand motions we’d rehearsed. And that was indeed the last time I saw her, sharing a song that we’d learned on the radio.

By the ’70s, when I was back in Louisiana, I had Casey Kasem’s American Top 40 to keep me in the loop every Sunday afternoon. I bought countless 45s based on what I heard on that program—from “Shannon” to “Chevy Van” to “Dancing Machine,” I was spending my allowance on what I loved most: music I heard on the radio.

As different as things are today—with more ways to discover music than I possibly have the energy to explore—it’s still radio that’s my first love. But now it’s NPR. My days begin and end with public radio—from Morning Edition when I have my coffee with Steve Inskeep, to Fresh Air when I have dinner with Terry Gross. I keep a notepad and pencil handy so I can jot down names of artists I hear—in just the past few weeks I’ve been turned on to recent releases by Melody Gardot and Eric Bibb after I heard them on Weekend Edition. And a friend of mine said she sold 40,000 copies of her independent album—in just two days—after she was featured on All Things Considered.

That’s the power of radio, then and now. It provides us with a community. It connects us to home. And from Sinatra to Ingrid Michaelson, it’s still the perfect place to meet an old flame or a new love.