I was born into a family of strict patriotic Canadians, and I speak with a Cockney accent, that I'm very proud of. The bigger kids in my elementary school, would taunt me outside the gym, the first thing each morning and the last thing, each afternoon. They would be standing there, waiting for me to say something to the kids that I rode the school bus with, and whenever I opened my mouth, they'd sing, "Shelby is a Cockney! Shelby is a Cockney!" I was between the ages 7 and 9, at the time. I've finally asked one of my teachers what a Cockney was, and they pointed the word out to me, in a dictionary. I think that the reason that I've picked up the accent at such a young age, was because I thought that my Canadian and American peers were a bunch of dinks who didn't respect people who were different, and I wanted some sort of foreign accent from the beginning, so that I wouldn't sound like those jerks.
_________________
The Family Enigma