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What's red, yellow, blue and purple and watched all over?

Ask most any 3- to 8-year-old kid, and he'll likely tell you it's The Wiggles.

Dressed in colorful, long-sleeved shirts, or skivvies, The Wiggles are Murray Cook (the Red Wiggle), Jeff Fatt (Purple Wiggle), Anthony Field (Blue Wiggle) and Sam Moran (Yellow Wiggle), members of an Australian children's band who drive a Big Red Car and perform a lot of silly songs to hundreds of screaming preschoolers. They will roll into Greensboro for two performances Saturday at the Greensboro Coliseum.

This is Greensboro's debut for Sam Moran, the new Yellow Wiggle.

"It's been great," Moran says. "The audience has been really responsive."

The group formed when Field, Cook and Greg Page began writing children's songs as part of a music project while studying early childhood education at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia. They enlisted the assistance of Fatt, who played with Field in a 1980s pop band called The Cockroaches.

The response to the songs was so positive, they took the finished tape to Australian Broadcasting Corporation Music, which released a self-titled album in 1991. And The Wiggles were born.

Popularity gained in the mid-'90s as the group toured and added characters that include Dorothy the Dinosaur, Wags the Dog, Henry the Octopus and a slapstick pirate named Captain Feathersword. By the late '90s, they began producing a television show, which was eventually picked up by Disney's cable channel.

Fifteen years and 27 video/DVD releases later, The Wiggles have garnered 17 gold, 12 platinum, three double platinum and 10 multi-platinum awards.

In late 2006, Moran replaced Greg Page. Page suffers from a chronic condition known as orthostatic intolerance, which affects balance and coordination. After struggling with the symptoms for months, Page decided to step down.

Moran's first appearance for The Wiggles was in a 1998 tour as host of "The Dorothy the Dinosaur Show." More recently, he appeared as Professor Singalottasonga and Dapper Dave. He was an understudy for Page for five years before donning the yellow skivvy.

"The transition for the audience has been smooth," Moran says.

The Wiggles' sound has had to adapt to include Moran, a classically trained vocalist.

"We've got four DVDs out now, and I'm moving forward," Moran says since joining the group. "It's new, slightly different sounding Wiggles stuff."

This tour is in support of "Pop Go the Wiggles."

"It's a brand new show," Moran says. "It's a hark back to the nursery rhymes that we grew up with."

Moran assures that those childhood favorites will be performed in classic Wiggles style with a few classic Wiggles tunes, plenty of dancing and lots of action from Captain Feathersword and other favorite characters.

"It's music we all love to play," Moran says of what the Wiggles are all about. "It's ... to be able to speak to a child on their level. It's merging something real unique, the fact that we are real people and interact with the children. We make them part of the show."

Here's a signature Wiggling Fingers to you, guys!

Carl Wilson is Go Triad calendar editor and occasional writer. Contact him at 373-7145 or carl.wilson@news-record.com