From the recording Heartbroken Forsaken and Alone

The story behind the song began when Glenn was approached in 1958 by Hank's first wife, Audrey, who told him that she had found some old lyrics of Hanks that he never finished writing. She asked Glenn, who was a big fan of Hanks, to finish writing the lyrics and to come up with a Hank Williams’ style melody for the song.

Although Glenn was young at the time, he had already written songs for Johnny Cash, Kitty Wells, Ernest Tubb, Hawkshaw Hawkins, and others. George Jones had just taken two of Glenn's songs to record. But the main reasons Audrey chose Glenn were because she knew that Glenn sang a lot of Hank's songs on his personal appearances and that he would probably come closer to finishing the song as Hank would have wanted.

Glenn waited until he had written more songs for Johnny Cash, George Jones, Bob Dylan, Tammy Wynette, Tennessee Ernie and many others before he attempted to finish writing the song Hank had started. In 1974, he was living in Tucson, Arizona, when he completed the song and mailed it to Acuff-Rose, Hank's publisher. He sent them a copy of the original Hank Williams lyrics along with a demo of the song. They had the handwriting checked by a hand writing expert, who concluded that it was indeed Hank William's handwriting.

In June of 1974, Fred Rose Music issued a publishing contract on the song, showing the writers as Hank Williams and Glenn D. Tubb. Before Glenn moved back to Nashville, Audrey died in November of 1975. He doesn't know if Audrey ever heard the finished product.

After Glenn returned to Nashville, he went to Acuff-Rose and had a meeting about the song. Because of some disagreements, the song was essentially buried until now.

Glenn met Jennifer Brantley in August of this year at a guitar pull dinner party in Nashville. After Jennifer heard the song and Glenn heard her voice, it was decided that Jennifer should record the song.