The Power of Elmo

Can someone please explain to me the power Elmo has over small children?  The only TV show we let Oliver watch is Play With Me Sesame on Sprout -- we DVR them and he watches them when we are getting ready for work.  That's it - otherwise, he's not watching TV.  We like the program because it is just puppet clips and are a good mix of new stuff (Bert plays computer games with Bernice the pigeon) and old clips that we remember  - Ah, Super Groover! 

Elmo, isn't one of the primary characters.  In addition to Ernie, Bert, Grover, and Prairie Dawn (how did she make the cut?), there are also regular appearance by Cookie Monster and Telly.  Elmo, Kermit, and some of the newer characters (Abby?) appear maybe once an episode.  Some characters, like Big Bird & Oscar are surprisingly missing... Anyway, my point is that Elmo isn't on the show daily. 

So how it is that he learned to say Elmo first???  Even though I have probably pointed out Grover (one of my faves) and Cookie Monster at least 3x as often....  We were at the mall this weekend and Oliver recognized, from across the store, a display of Elmo dolls.  Unbelievable.  I didn't even know that Elmo was one of the characters on his silverware until Oliver pointed it out to me.