Now that I’m back in commercial radio and lending my voice to recorded advertisements, my internal soundtrack — the background stuff I hear continuously inside my head — has shifted a bit. With Easter right around the corner, this little ditty keeps popping up.

Here comes Peter Cottontail

Hopping down the Wigwam trail

With lots of Easter bargains for you!

There were several Wigwam department stores on Oahu but none on Maui. Their generic, year-round jingle was more of a chant:

Your dollar buys more, your dollar buys more,

Your dollar buys more at your Wigwam store;

WIGWAM! (Puh puh pum pum)

I remember wanting to visit Honolulu so that I, too, could buy toys at Wigwam and dine at

Kenny’s . . . in the Kam Shopping Center in Kalihi-i-i.

By the time I moved to Oahu as a young adult, Wigwam stores were gone, but I did get to eat at Kenny’s. I’m sure they, like most local restaurants and every household at the time, used monosodium glutamate (MSG) — better known as Aji, Aji, Ajinomoto Aji-no-mo-tooooh!

The catchy jingle was also the answer to the riddle: What did the chef say when he dropped his knife on his foot? (Ah, gee, no more toe!)

Over the years, Longs Drugs went through a number of jingles and slogans. The most enduring version was

Make Longs a part of your day,

We’ll try to help in every way;

You’ll always find the very best at Longs!

But my personal favorite was this oldie but goodie:

Shop today at Longs Drugs

Where they make the price behave;

All your neighbors shop at Longs

Where all Hawaii saves.

More than just a drug store;

Thousands of things galore!

They’re mighty long on value

At Longs Drug Store!

In the 1970s and ’80s, some of the larger local businesses used popular songs to convey their messages on TV. The first one I remember was Kui Lee’s “The Days of My Youth” on a Love’s Bread commercial. The band Hiroshima charged up Hawaiian Electric Co. commercials with their instrumental “Hawaiian Electric.” But I think the most effective use of song for sales was the Hawaiian Telephone campaign featuring the Peter Moon Band’s “Far Too Wide.” The commercials touted long-distance calling, tugging at our hearts with images of family members separated by miles of ocean. I think Robert Cazimero sang it, with lyrics written specifically for the commercial.

Far away and out of touch,

People I know and love so much

I do believe this ocean is far too wide for me.

Thinking back to times with you,

There’s nothing else I’d rather do

I wish that there were some way to walk across the sea.

Even now, I get teary-eyed when I remember the look on the gray-haired mom’s face as she answered the phone and exclaimed, “You must have read my mind!”

And you can’t pass the kamaaina test without singing the Exchange jingle.

The Exchange

Goes down, down, down

And round, round, round

In your tum, tum, tum.

Makes your mind

Sing “Yum, yum, yum”

That orangeade called Exchange!

Extra credit if you remember the first verse used “glass” instead of “tum.”

Less memorable was the Love’s Bread jingle that used the melody of “Hilo March.” None of my friends remember it, and a few have accused me of making it up, but I’m sure it was used in the late 1960s.

Love’s soft-rolled bread,

It’s just as fresh as it can be,

As the showcase wrapper plainly lets you see.

For decades, I’ve tried to recall the lines that followed. “Delicious and nutritious” may have been part of the lyrics. If you can fill in the blank, please email me and ease my mind. I’m starting to wonder whether my mental abilities have been affected by all those hours spent watching “Checkers and Pogo” and “50th State Big Time Wrestling.”

Or was it the Ajinomoto?

* Kathy Collins is a storyteller, actress and freelance writer whose “Sharing Mana’o” column appears every Wednesday. Her email address is kcmaui913@gmail.com.