Breast cancer survivor Tig Notaro finds the funny in cancer

There are thousands of stand-up comedians out there. Many are funny, most sound the same.

And then there's Tig Notaro.

It would be almost impossible to predict what she'll say, as nobody else sounds like Tig Notaro. Not now, not in the past.

As a new fan commented on one of her YouTube videos: 'Never thought I would laugh at cancer.”

In a phone interview from her Los Angeles home, she was asked to complete the sentence: 'Tig is Steven Wright meets ...”

After pondering, she replied, 'I guess Chrissie Hynde, Paula Poundstone and my mother.”

Inspired by Poundstone, Notaro (previously a band manager) tried an open mic night at Little Frida's, a Los Angeles cafe. That first show 20 years ago went well, and the Mississippi native's career was launched as a comedian-storyteller. She just talks about her quirky life and makes observations.

'At first,” Notaro recalled, 'I didn't think I would ever make a living at it. I thought I would do open mics forever, and I was content with that.”

She was becoming known as a hilariously quirky storyteller when her body decided to go a different way. She was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2012. And lived to joke about it.

As she said on 'Late Night With Conan O'Brien” in 2014: 'I made so many jokes over the years about how small my chest was. I started to think maybe my boobs overheard me. And were like, ‘You know what, we're sick of this. Let's kill her.'”

She went further later that year, when as part of the New York Comedy Festival, she performed topless. (According to the New York Times, 'She showed the audience her scars and then, through the force of her showmanship, made you forget that they were there. It was a powerful, even inspiring, statement about survival and recovery, and yet, it had the larky feel of a dare.”)

What was that like?

'It crept up in my head as something I really wanted to do after my surgery,” Notaro said. 'It wouldn't leave my mind.”

She tried the topless thing at a club in Los Angeles but said she didn't feel confident there.

But the second time, in New York, 'I really felt confident. It was very exhilarating. I thought it would be cool to do for my (Emmy-nominated 'Boyish Girl Interrupted”) HBO special,” Notaro said

Although she hasn't gone topless in a show since, she said, 'I don't like to say if I'm going to or not going to.”