If you got more than one letter from somebody who said they hated you, it meant they kept watching.
I was a huge David Letterman fan, even going back to when he was on NBC. My parents would only let me watch a half hour of television a day, so I would record Letterman the night before and then watch it when I came home from school. That's what made me want to do a T.V. show.
Most of my teachers didn't like me. I didn't get good grades because I pretty much lived at the public access studio. I tried to be the class clown, so I spent a lot of time in detention.
With anything you put out there, you're going to offend somebody, but most people get that it's a joke, that I'm playing a character, and that I'm actually making fun of what I'm saying by saying it.
I was very young, and I kind of decided I wanted to do comedy. My parents were musicians, so we traveled on a tour bus. You're in a different town every night; as a kid, you're trying to make friends fast. You try to be funny.