Pooh's feature career flourished with several films including, Pooh's Grand Adventure: The Search for Christopher Robin in 1997 (right) and Piglet's Big Movie in 2003.

Moving Pooh into educational TV, as mentioned, was not difficult. At first, Hohlfeld, "found it a bit more restricting due to the need for a curriculum (lesson). But at the same time it was a bit freeing, because the lessons led to lots of story ideas." In production for nearly three years (only one and half in full production), Hohlfeld found the series itself evolving. "The first ones are more tied to the specific curriculum. Later, we started having more fun as the lessons became lighter in tone." For example? An early episode has the mystery solvers try to figure out what Roo should give to Kanga as a gift. In a later episode, "Darby becomes a giant after drinking one of Rabbit's formulas," explains Hohlfeld with a chuckle.

Also new to Hohlfeld is the amount of pre-production testing that goes on. "They take the first draft of the script and create an illustrated storybook to read to kids. This helps fine tune what kids really understand." He was surprised to find some ideas were a bit too abstract for the under five-year-olds. One pleasant surprise was how well the kids take to Buster, Darby's dog. There had been discussion as to whether Buster would talk. But it was decided to keep it "real" since it belonged to Darby who is "real."

Always important to the world of Pooh are the songs and ditties that Pooh and his friend hum or sing. The new series is no different. Music is by popular rock icon (and now animation music master) Andy Sturmer. Sturmer, who previously produced for such legends as Ringo Starr, Brian Wilson and Ozzy Osbourne, has recently become a top toon-tunesmith, creating title songs for such series as Teen Titans and complete scores for Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi.

The lyrics are by Hohlfeld, himself. His career as a lyricist was a bit of serendipity. "It came by accident. When I was working on the Piglet feature, they brought in Carly Simon to write the music. They took several of the poems from the film and had her put music to them. It was everyone's assumption that they were authentic rhymes from Milne. However, I had to inform everyone that those were original ditties I had created for the script. Everyone loved them, and suddenly I was a lyricist."

Moving Pooh into educational TV was not difficult. At first, writer/producer Brian Hohfield found incorporating lessons into the story a bit restrictive, but ultimately he viewed them as story ideas.

As mentioned, Hohfield felt the character of Pooh, and his desire to "think" would work well in a pre-school environment. "I am really happy at how universal Pooh's world is. The characters do skew a bit young. But it is amazing at times. Two-year-olds already seem to know the characters and just love watching the color and movement. Four-year-olds are just about the right age. Five-year-olds like to watch, because it makes them seem 'smarter' than the characters."

I wondered if Hohfield missed writing more sophisticated adult comedies. "Not at all! I am a big fan of children's books. Being able to work on such a classic is wonderful." In fact, for Piglet's Big Movie, he incorporated the last Milne story that Disney had not yet presented. Is there another book he would like to adapt? "I think the Frog and Toad series by Arnold Lobel are great. I would love to do something with them in animation."

For the time being, Hohfield has his slate full. He is finishing up the first order of 26 half hours of My Friends Tigger & Pooh. Recently, he got word that the series was picked up for another season. Now he and his team will have to turn their caps around and "think, think, think" up more puzzlers for the new toon trio to tackle.

John Cawley is a producer of animation whose résumé includes Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, New World/Marvel, Film Roman and Sullivan-Bluth. Cawley, an author of several books on animation, has also written for comics and animation. He is a lecturer on animation production and an established mascot performer.