Mary Lou Williams, it seems, was born to play piano. Self taught at an early age, she helped  support her 10 half brothers and sisters at age 6,by playing private parties. A year later she started playing publicly in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, where she was raised..  Throughout her career she wrote and arranged hundreds of compositions  for the great bandleaders, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker,  and Dizzie Gillespie.