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Aaliyah, which means "highest, most exalted one", was born in Brooklyn, New York, on January 16, 1979 and grew up in Detroit, Michigan. She had an early start in show business, playing an orphan in her elementary school production of Annie at the age of just 6. "I had one little line," she once recalled. "But what I loved about it was just putting the production together, being in the chorus, learning the routines, singing and doing a little bit of acting. That's when I said, I've got to do this forever". At age ten, Aaliyah hit the famous Star Search stage and performed her own rendition of Chaka Khan's My Funny Valentine. Although she did not win the competition, she would look back and remember this as a real learning experience. Her uncle, Barry Hankerson, was an entertainment lawyer who was once married to Gladys Knight. Due to this connection, at age 11 Aaliyah got the opportunity to sing with Gladys Knight's troupe in Las Vegas, another experience that Aaliyah remembers fondly. From there, the dedicated singer would emerge from a nonstop vocal training regimen with a sound and vision completely her own. "It ca