There’s not a playground in the world where Sharon Hampson and Bram Morrison could be sure of going unnoticed, but certainly in midtown’s Sharon, Lois & Bram playground, going incognito is impossible.

Minutes after they arrive at June Rowlands Park, young parents begin to hover, elephant-sized grins spreading, while their kids shyly cower, confused by the fuss.

Sensing this, Hampson promptly kneels down and employs the ultimate tough-crowd antidote with one tot: she softly sings the opening bars of “Skinnamarink.” A moment later, Hampson hoists the happy toddler into her arms for a photo.

“When your generation comes,” Hampson said, referring to 30-ish senior millennials, “their kids are often very little and don’t have a clue who we are. And the parents are just in tears.

“It’s so sweet.”

It is, and also a little bittersweet. Because while generations grew up on the trio’s buoyant tunes and winsome CBC series, the event that seemed to reawaken our memories of Sharon, Lois & Bram was perhaps Lois Lilienstein’s death last spring.

It’s not the group’s first devastating personal loss. As usual, they dealt with it together.

The friendship between Hampson, 73, and Morrison really is a sight to behold. Hampson, youthful in a canary-yellow sweater and a chic leather jacket, is rubber-ducky ebullient, while the droll Morrison, 75, has a memory like, well, an elephant.

Sitting near the sterling new Sharon, Lois & Bram Music Garden — to be unveiled with a concert Saturday — it’s not enough to say they finish each other’s sentences; more accurately, their anecdotes unspool like ping-pong rallies.

They met as teenage “folkies” in Toronto’s ‘60s coffee house scene. After working with Lilienstein in the Mariposa in the Schools program, the trio decided to make an album (after stringing their names together “in every possible order,” by the way.)

They had modest expectations for 1978’s One Elephant, Deux Éléphants and, Hampson says, “no ambition to start a career.” They recorded it and pressed 5,000 copies with a $20,000 loan from friends and family. Months later, they repaid everyone, stuffing cheques in Christmas crackers at their holiday party.

From the beginning, eclectic musicality was a “beacon,” and their debut mixes folk, jazz, calypso, swing, even Bach. “We understood that our audience wasn’t just children,” Morrison said.

The sunny Elephant Show aired on CBC in 1984, and eventually on Nickelodeon. They’ve been recognized in Africa, China and London. Morrison once felt a Hong Kong hostess staring at him, only to notice she was tracing the hand movements for “The Eensy Weensy Spider.”

They ran their own record company and remain meticulous. For this music garden, the city initially sent a list of suggested instruments. Hampson and Morrison rejected that and chose to extensively research and select their own.

Hadn’t the city expected them to just quickly sign off?

“Well, that’s not us,” Morrison laughed. “We may have bothered them.”

The group doesn’t lack for concrete milestones: a veritable vault of platinum and gold records; a White House photo with then-U.S. President Bill Clinton, the group clad in colourful silk jackets; and appointments to the Order of Canada.

And yet, they didn’t expect the outpouring of grief after Lilienstein died. The next day, Hampson and Morrison drove to her house in “schlepping clothes” and were stunned (but appreciative) to find TV cameras waiting.

Pixar movies have moistened many an adult eye by poignantly acknowledging how we discard what we loved as kids. Could Lilienstein’s death have inspired renewed admiration? Yes, Hampson says, there’s new interest.

“Too bad it was at that cost,” Morrison added.

For a trio associated with everlasting cheer, they’ve been through a lot.

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Hampson thrice battled breast cancer, once having surgery weeks before TV production starting. Then, Morrison says, the threesome was “one at a time widowed in different Novembers.”

Lilienstein lost her husband in 1998 and decided to stop touring (Sharon and Bram continued, and continue, as a duo). Hampson’s husband died in 2006, and Morrison’s wife in 2009.

“We weathered many storms,” said Hampson. “We’ve been side by side through all the struggles.”

The trio’s families and children are “intertwined.” They’ll keep performing until “people don’t want to hear us anymore.”

Well, judging by the fans lingering by the duo with peanut butter-and-jelly stickiness on this day, it doesn’t seem that day is comin’ round the mountain just yet.

“It took me a while to figure out, but when fans get tearful it’s because it takes them back to happy memories they shared within the family,” Hampson said.

“It just thrills us that they’re singing those songs with their children. It’s the best thing that can happen.”

How did Sharon, Lois & Bram influence you?

Sophie Milman, Juno-winning jazz singer: “Unlike my Canuck husband, I was born in Russia and raised in Israel so I wasn’t aware of Sharon, Lois & Bram until I had my son three years ago. I thought (their songs) were adorable and easy to remember, a must for sleep-deprived mothers without the capacity to memorize complex music. Jacob, my son, responded to them instantly, which made them immediate favourites for me. I used to sing ‘Skinnamarink’ and tickle him and he was just elated. The same is true for my four-month-old daughter.”

Tyler Bancroft of Juno-winning indie-rock band Said the Whale: “I’m almost positive that TheElephant Show was literally the first show I ever watched on television. Did Sharon, Lois & Bram teach morals that stuck with me forever? Did they help shape the person I am today? Has ‘Skinnamarink’ been stuck in my head since I was less than a year old? To that last question, I can answer ‘YES’ with 100 per cent certainty — and so I can only assume that the first two are also true!”

Becky Ninkovic, You Say Party: “Every time I put on The Elephant Show for my daughter, she expresses the same excitement that I remember feeling when I was a child. It’s a joyful thing that my daughter and I can share in the experience that my own mother and I shared together.”

Dan Davidson, “Found” singer: “Sharon, Lois, and Bram were the first concert I ever went to. My mom took me when I was a toddler and I was dancing in the aisles! Now my toddler is doing the same dances around the house to the same songs — it’s pretty amazing if you think about it.”