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The decoding stage is stumping me.

eg. Have extra letters S, M (or maybe H), D, E, A ... across and U, N, S, M, W ... down.
Adding these to the charcter in the non-parody song gives:

ehgdm or ecgdm across
givmk down.

Noticed GIVE if after the first 3 down clues I insert the first across clue (WHY?) but suspected I've got something fundamentally wrong.
So then I tried adding the name in the parody, getting cmhdk from the first few across and eiwl from the first few down.

Time to give up I fear, unless someone would be kind enough to tell me where I'm going wrong?

I think across extras start gmxesjs... And downs r nsmws, but my copy is a bit muddled with letters now...

We started with X for 11 across, but I think it's probably lad. Could be lax through, so I've checked both. Then encoding them, get nowhere ...

It is lax (backwards) then i for electric current, son for boy.
Add the 4 letter non-parody song name, x codes to a. Message is 5, 5, 6, 5, 2, 5, 5 ,3, 5

Thanks so much. Agreed x codes to a. So the start looks promising Won't get chance to revisit until later.

Think I've got all the letters right now - except perhaps SOUTH? Got that from the last four across clues and first down clue.

I've got the verse, I think. What a kerfuffle to do so! Notice the poet's surname all over the puzzle.

Can't quite parse a couple of the answers either, in particular 1ac and 35 ac.

And some were interpretable two ways eg. 11 ac) easy going = NO S(weat) Boy = LA(D) and over refers to turn; or easy going = LA(X) and over means in front of.

jazzlover, there is another thread on this which may give you some hints, such as for 1ac. For 35a I'm not quite sure myself but FAT = money.

Yes I thought FAT must equal that too, Orson.
I've given up now, put it in an envelope and will leave it there.