 Having wanted to do so since the age of three, her parents initially managed to stave off her persistence, allowing her piano lessons at the age of 9.Eighteen months later, having taken well to the piano, she was allowed to have her first harp lesson.Beginning on an Irish instrument called the clarsach (an instrument that isn't as big as a concert harp and doesn't have the pedal mechanism), she was taught by a local teacher initially who had to return to her native Czechoslovakia after a year.