It turns out I like banging away at chords. I’m now spending more time just randomly playing patterns of chords than following the app itself. I’m not sure if this is a good or a bad thing.

I think it’s good to practice myself and see what I can learn by trying different rhythms, different keys and hearing the difference it makes (usually awful). But am I getting into bad patterns that will hamper me later?

For the moment, I’m going with it’s good to noodle. Elton John didn’t have an app. Lang Lang doesn’t take an iPad out when he wants to practice. So why should I?

(Obvious answer – because they have years of experience and I have only a couple of weeks).

I’m going to be number one!

But first I need to learn how play chords. So far I’ve been playing with my right hand and learning the essentials of how to read sheet music. Today, I have to chose. I can continue with essential skills or I can change course on Simply Piano to learn about pop chords.

The choice is easy – I’m going to be number 1 and all I need is “three chords and the truth”!

However as three chords and the truth is considered to be the basis for all country songs, I might also need a stetson, a heartbreak, a truck, a Bud, a hometown gal and the Good Lord above. None of which are offered in the app.

My number one might be a long time off yet.

I now know the basics of reading sheet music. And by basics I mean that as long as the sheet music shows a single note I think I can work out how to play it. If it shows anything more complicated, then it might be a language I recognise, like English, but spoken by someone from Aberdeen in a broadest Doric, fit like. Incomprehensible.

I like the fact the app tries to teach both theory and practice. But I don’t know how well it does this as I’ve nothing to compare it too.

They say that if you learn a foreign language then you pick up the accent of the person who teaches you it. So, if you learn English from an Aberdonian you will pick up their accent too. You won’t sound like a BBC newsreader, you’ll sound like a sheep farmer.

For all I know, the app could be teaching me to sound like a sheep farmer rather than Elton John. But I am enjoying it and it provides a useful guide to progress as I can see that songs and concepts are becoming more complicated as I progress through it. Just don’t ask me to read more than one note.

There are 88 keys on a full size piano. 53 white and 36 black. I thought all pianos would be the same but each piano is subtly different in key size and response. If you want to know how they differ then watch this video as one man starts playing with the cheapest piano he can find and then works his way up to one worth $3m.

Along with an app I have a book: Alfred’s Basic Adult Piano Course: Lesson Book Level 1

Along with practicing each day following the app, I’m working my way through the book too. So far, I’ve learned that I need to curl my fingers like I’m holding a ball. I’m assuming tennis, rather than football.

What it doesn’t say, as my Mrs TwinBikeRun, has found out, is how hard is to do that when you have longer nails. She can’t press down on the keys without flattening her hand as, if she curls her fingers, she’s pressing down with the nail rather than the tips of her fingers.

Someone should invent piano gloves for women. A special pair of gloves that you can stick your hands in, nails and all, and have some foam under the nail to create extra long fingers.

A bit like the gloves in Roald Dahl’s The Witches, but without the whole being a witch and transforming children into mice bits.

Now, where’s the application form for Dragon’s Den?