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Reba McEntire shares the simple advice her mom gave her before her 1st performance at age 6

"When you have that kind of help, you can just do about anything,” McEntire said.
/ Source: TODAY

Reba McEntire's mom, Jacqueline, was one of her biggest supporters, starting from the singer's first performance in elementary school.

On the April 23 edition of Sunday Sitdown, McEntire opened up to Willie Geist about her mom's role in encouraging her to pursue music and the words that helped bolster her courage.

McEntire said she grew up singing with her family.

"We didn’t have radio in the car. It was four kids in the backseat, rough-housin’ and, you know — Mama would get us to sing to pass the time," she said. "We were the Singing McEntires."

But McEntire told Geist she noticed that people really started to listen to her when she performed during a Christmas program at Kiowa High School in her home state of Oklahoma.

Reba McEntire said her mother was "encouraging."
Reba McEntire said her mother was "encouraging."Daniel Wood / NBC

"I wanted attention," she said. "And I figured out the best kind of attention I could get was when I would sing. Not running barrels, not playing basketball, but singing. That’s when everybody kind of leaned forward and listened a little bit more."

McEntire especially remembered the words her mom told her right before she was going to perform.

"Well, Mama was encouraging me, saying, 'It’ll be fine. You can do it.' And so when you have that kind of help, you can just do about anything," McEntire said.

When the "Does He Love You" singer made it big in the music industry, she thought about her mother once again when she decided to try her hand at acting.

McEntire said her mother always told her she "had the attention span of a 2 year old."

"So, I have to have different things," McEntire said. "I do something so long, do the same thing, I get bored."

While her interest in acting started out as an "itch," she said, she later starred in the hit sitcom "Reba," which ran for six seasons. McEntire attributes her performance in "Annie Get Your Gun" with giving her the "credentials" needed to star in a sitcom.

"I didn't know anything about that business," she said.

After Geist asked if she was "kinda faking" her way into acting, McEntire responded with, "I did."

"Smoke and bells and whistles," she added with a laugh.

Now, after wrapping up her latest tour at Madison Square Garden, McEntire become "emotional," she said, partly because it was her first time performing at the venue.

"It holds such history for me and my family," she said. "Grandpap roped there during the rodeo in the ‘30s. Daddy roped there during the rodeo in the ‘40s ... And it felt like they were with us there at Madison Square Garden."

But even with mascara running down her face, the show had to go on, she said.

"The adoration or the acceptance — everybody wants to be loved and accepted, I’m no different," she said. "I mean, we’re up there on the stage, razzle dazzle, but we’re very insecure people in the inside. And after the second song, the applause went on for a long time."