he song "We've Only Just Begun" was an appropriate single for the brother-and-sister act known as The Carpenters. Over the next few years, the winners of the 1970 Best New Artist Grammy dominated the charts in a way few acts had before.

Richard and Karen Carpenter were both musically trained as teenagers. Richard played the organ in his family's church while Karen took drum lessons at Drum City.

First charting on Oct. 3, 1970, "We've Only Just Begun" was Downey, Calif. pop duo The Carpenters' second Top 40 single (for four weeks) and their first of five No. 2 hits to chart on the Billboard Hot 100. It was the follow-up to their No. 1 "(They Long To Be) Close To You" from their A&M debut album Close To You, which first charted on Sept. 19, 1970, also rising to No. 2 on the Hot 200 LP chart and remaining on the chart for 87 weeks. It was certified gold by the R.I.A.A. on Nov. 13, 1970.

A meeting with Wes Jacobs led to the formation of The Richard Carpenter Trio, a jazz combo that was eventually signed to RCA Records. After Jacobs left the duo took a job performing at Disneyland and opened for the rock group Steppenwolf before signing a new deal with A&M Records.

The Carpenters' first single, a remake of The Beatles' "Ticket To Ride," climbed to #54 and served as a teaser for what came next. "(They Long To Be) Close To You" became the duo's first chart-topper, spending a month at #1 in 1970. For their follow-up, The Carpenters turned to a song first popularized in a television commercial. "We've Only Just Begun" was written by Roger Nichols and Paul Williams as a jingle before The Carpenters made it a hit. Williams explained the song's origin in Stephen Bishop's Songs In The Rough, "Crocker Bank was going to do a commercial showing a young couple getting married, kissing, and at the reception, then riding off into the sunset. It was going to say, 'You have a long way to go. We'd like to help you get there. The Crocker Bank.' Roger [Nichols] and I wrote this commercial. I sang it, and we were mixing a demo of something else, and I grabbed an envelope and scratched down the lyrics, and it was probably the record that changed our lives."

"This song has become our signature tune," Richard Carpenter acknowledged in the liner notes to the group's boxed set, From The Top. "Around the time we were recording the Close To You album, I took notice of a TV commercial for Crocker Citizens Bank. A soft sell campaign, it featured a young couple getting married and driving into the sunset. The song, expressly written for the commercial, was 'We've Only Just Begun.' It caught my ear immediately. As the commercial featured Paul's singing, I assumed it was a Nichols/Williams song and spoke with Paul on the A&M lot shortly thereafter. Paul informed me that I was correct and that the song did have both a bridge and a third verse. I was curious, as the ads contained only the first and second verses. Upon hearing the demo I was convinced the song was a hit and went into the sound stage to work out the arrangement." Many years later Williams would confess that there was no third verse originally, but he eagerly wrote one immediately for the opportunity to have a hot act like The Carpenters cover one of his songs.

While "Close To You" was still in the Top 10, "We've Only Just Begun" made its chart debut at #84. Within eight weeks, the song was spending the first of four weeks at #2, something the duo grew accustomed to over the next three years. "Rainy Days And Mondays" (#2, 1971), "Superstar" (#2, 1971), "Hurting Each Other" (#2, 1972), and "Yesterday Once More" (#2, 1973) would also climb to the runner-up position on the Billboard Hot 100 pop chart.

- Christopher G. Feldman, The Billboard Book of No. 2 Singles, Billboard, 2000.