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He’s got a sparkle in his eye, that boy.

DAN: My parents say I was a “miracle baby”. I arrived after they’d been married for 17 years and already had two wonderful adopted children. In the hospital, when Mum got her baby — me! — the nurse said I was a very good baby, as the others cried and I slept through the night. But my mum had a funny feeling, and had my hearing tested.

At six months I got my first hearing aids. It was 1979, and I was the youngest baby in Scotland to get them. Then my mum took me to a clinic in LA to learn how to help me talk. She and Dad thought I’d be able to learn to sign later. All through school I had a teacher of the deaf beside me. And my reading and writing was delayed because of my profound deafness. It was hard for me and my parents. But KT helped, and she’d always add sparkle. She had an amazing imagination and was a great mimic — with body language.

I was about seven when I was told KT and Jo were adopted. As I was deaf it was hard for them to explain it to me. Everything came late to me. But I’ve been with them all my life, so it feels like they’re my natural brother and sister.

KT and I played together a lot — and she played her piano and flute too. Though she says there was not much music in our home, I disagree!

In 2002 I had an operation — the cochlear implant. KT and my parents came for the “switch on”. It was very exciting. There were tears! It has helped me so much with understanding speech, environmental sounds. I can hear the higher frequencies of the voices of the children I coach, and I can hear music much better. I can now recognise which song KT is singing, and even pick them out on TV or in shops, though I can’t pick out individual words.

I had the operation just before KT became famous. Now, when I come to see her gigs, I can hear the beat, the drumming. I can hear the guitar, the piano. But the most difficult thing is lip-reading, because it’s too far away and she’s very close to the microphone. I like KT’s music. One time I was driving to Cornwall, and I listened to the Black Horse on repeat! If it’s loud I can feel the vibrations. She sang to me on my 23rd birthday at the Scala in London, and she taught everyone to sign Happy Birthday. At my 21st birthday party she sang a song she’d written for me, King of the Court, and did a slide show so my deaf friends could read the words.

My parents found out I was good at tennis when I was about five. Deaf tennis changed my life. We play in separate tournaments because we can’t hear information from our opponents’ rackets — if they hit with slice or spin, or the ball hits the net cord. We can’t wear hearing aids because sweat stops them working.

KT and Jo are very supportive. But we have had problems. KT was singing in pubs for 10 years; everybody would tell me she was really good, but we thought she was never going to make it. Then when she came to London to go on TV, on Later… with Jools Holland, I realised she’d made it. I was very proud of her but had no idea how big she’d be.

At home I call her Kate, but at a gig I call her KT. And everybody calls me “KT’s brother”! I don’t mind, but some people think she comes from another world and say I should be in London. KT’s brother living in Devizes? But I like working in my tennis club.

KT is a fantastic person. She’s very caring. Being profoundly deaf without her would have been different — she helped my confidence. My parents say their children have taken them to amazing places, to worlds they knew nothing about. They say they gave us “wings to fly and roots to find home”

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