Tuned In or Tuned Out?

I've come to a realization about myself.
And how I listen to Music.
It stems from my getting to know a rapper,not my music of choice, and having their music shared with me and saying to them that I can't understand the lyrics.
In my defense they are delivered lightning fast in most cases but I then started thinking about the music I do listen to by choice.
The music I have listened to for ages and I became aware that for years I have not been listening to lyrics. 
Maybe not hearing them since I am predisposed by heredity to loss of hearing. Being hard of hearing doesn't account for not knowing the lyrics to songs I've known most of my Life,however.
It seems I have not been listening to or paying attention to lyrics for as long as I have been listening to music and yet there are songs that I know all the lyrics by heart! I can quote them,I remember, them I sing along when I hear them.
Granted some of this can be attributed to the fact that I used to peruse ,scan,devour album covers in a certain period of my existence and thusly,read the lyrics ,sinking them into my memory but that doesn't account for songs I only heard on the radio.
Songs I had no reason to care about what was being said and yet I know them. I know what's coming up when I hear them.
That last statement brought up a point that I believe may be at the center of this confusing conundrum: 
Do I care about what I am listening to? Are the lyrics the important part of a song to me,what I zero in on or am I drawn more to the beat,the guitar sounds,the instruments in general and the percussion in particular?
I have been known to bang a drum in my time. Is that where-in my music listening has always been centered? 
Why are some song lyrics effortlessly implanted into my mind and others never even considered? Is this common among others or a quirk in myself?
I don't know if I will ever get the answers to these questions. For years I never even noticed that I wasn't actually paying attention to what was being said and in the present I find myself not actually being able to identify the lyrics.Heck,I don't even know the titles of songs I have known for ages and possibly know by heart!
I love music. It is one of the most important things in my Life and always has been yet I find myself enjoying long periods of silence and have come to this lack of importance of lyrics thing and I wonder just where does it stand in importance to me.
I won't be giving up on it anytime soon,though and I won't be knowing what the songs are about like always but at least I realize it now!