They all sang. The average person knew the lyrics to 200 songs. There were 300 piano brands when the U.S. entered Ww1. There were 10 x 1 million sellers of sheet music, played by 1 pianist to many partying singers, hundreds more songs in the 10,000 seller range. Grammaphone & Victrola were expensive novelties, mostly used in music stores to move along stale inventory, lacking the projection power that would come with stereo hi-fi in the 1950s.
But by 1932, Libby, who had sung at her cousins’ house, was listening to music in talkies, Jeanette MacDonald, Nelson Eddie & Ramon Navarro light opera flix, so Libby forgot she could sing. But before radio (1923);), if you wanted music, you had to make it yourself.