El Rushbo, who also went by the birth name of Rush Limbaugh, has been gone now for one year Thursday.

Seems a bit hard to recall when there was a time that, somewhere across the fruited plain between the hours of Noon to 3 pm Eastern, you could not tune into the man who made radio magic with one half of his brain tied behind his back, just to make it fair for the liberals who opposed him.

Yet this past year, we have been forced to live without the voice that made it fun to listen to A.M. radio back in the late ’80s and ’90s, and became a cultural tour de force. What a year this has been, and Lord knows, there are millions of us that yearn to hear what Rush would have thought of it all, sitting behind the golden E.I.B. microphone.

He is truly missed.

All of us have that story of the first time we heard Limbaugh; mine is really no different from any other. I was a snot-nosed kid of 18 years sitting in a car, eating Little Caesars pizza purchased from a K-Mart, and the car only had an A.M radio. As I was scrolling through the dial (no digital radios yet, back in those days, kids) I came across WXYT 1270 A.M. in Detroit and heard Clarence “Frogman” Henry signing his hit, “Aint Got No Home,” with someone talking over the song, but just uttering one letter at a time.

E…..I……B.

That booming voice that Rush had then went on to explain (during the theme song for his homeless update) what was the story to be debunked on that topic for the day. When he went on to explain that American “activist” and fraud peddler Abbie Hoffman had made some outrageous claim that millions of people were dying on the street each year due to homelessness, Rush went in for the verbal kill. He opined that if this were true — it would be a good idea to buy cemetery plots now before the yards filled up. Prices would undoubtedly go up, so buy while the prices were still cheap.

I couldn’t help but laugh.

“America’s Anchorman” had given me my first lesson in demonstrating absurdity by being absurd and I, like millions of others, was hooked.

I have always been fascinated by the “art” of doing a good radio show. In the age of television, it has become a bit more laborious to hold people captive to a voice for 20 minutes, let alone three hours; yet Limbaugh did it with pizazz that has not been seen before or since his show. Limbaugh’s ability to combine common sense with the ability to explain issues in a simple way, and the way he made it entertaining, was amazing. That he lasted for over 30 years on over 600 radio stations — and became a legend doing it — shows that it worked.

When you hear someone say that he saved A.M. radio, that is not an overstatement because he did. The A.M. side of the dial was rapidly becoming a graveyard, as F.M. stations become more prevalent due to the clarity of the signal. The A.M. side of the radio was rapidly becoming the spot for small-town news broadcasts, or things like religious services or farm reports. Yet when the FCC abolished the “Fairness Doctrine” in 1987, which demanded that holders of any broadcast license make sure that opposing sides were given a chance to have their voices heard, that cleared the way for Rush to flourish.

Maha Rushie seized the day and the rest is history.

In the past year, how many of us would have loved to have heard him laugh over some of the stumbling and bumblings of the 46th President of the United States. or as Rush affectionately called him, “Plugs.”

How we would have tuned in to hear him do a monologue for over two hours, just on the latest revelations that the investigation into Russia, Russia, Russia was really just a hit job to get Trump — like he thought all along.

If we could have just had one more “Open Line Friday,” and the opportunity to throw some random point at him and see what he would have done with it. I both hate and love all of you that were lucky enough to get in to talk to the man who changed the way that radio and media were done. You lucky sons of guns.

Any person who has a radio show or has done a podcast has imitated Rush in some small way. He was able to blend facts with humor, and show that if you are entertaining enough, people will even tune in if they hate you. Each and everyone one of us, big or small, owes him a debt of thanks we will never be able to repay. So from the bottom of my heart, I thank you, Rush, and thank the Lord that He saw fit to put you on this Earth, in this country that you so loved.

We are all better off for it.

The Doctor of Democracy checked out of the big blue marble we call Earth a year ago today, and now resides where the sun always shines and there is never a rainout for a golf game. He earned this eternal reward, and it is up to us to pick up where he left off, as difficult as it still may seem. He left us the guide, and if we do it with the same zeal and cheer that he did, we will all be okay.

Godspeed to Rush, and to his family and friends who still miss him to this day.