How we made: Car Wash by Rose Royce

This will never be a hit, we told each other - we are literally singing about a car wash!'

I was singing in a band called the Jewels and was spotted and recommended to Norman Whitfield. I had no idea he was a legendary Motown songwriter and producer. I went to meet him at his mansion in Beverly Hills and said: Sir, why do you have all these gold and platinum records on your walls?" He dropped to the floor and laughed for 20 minutes. Later everyone went: The Norman Whitfield? The Temptations? Marvin Gaye?" But I was this little girl from Biloxi in Mississippi. I never read the names on the back of albums.