Rumba or Marcarena, cha-cha or salsa — everybody likes some kind of Latin music.

It's a lot like Italian food. Maybe you're an epicure versed in the intricacies of Tuscan or Sicilian cuisine; maybe you've never ventured beyond a bowl of delicious spaghetti and meatballs.

That doesn't matter. Your own ethnicity doesn't matter. You simply like Italian food, the way everybody does. Who wouldn't, when it's so good?

That's the way everyone, naif or sophisticate, likes some kind of Latin music. It's just too good to resist.

Lin-Manuel Miranda, the writer and composer who created "In the Heights," then starred in the show on Broadway, values all those Latin music lovers, connoisseurs and newcomers alike. He figures that he fits both categories.

"Whatever people say about the ("In the Heights") score, you can tell that the people who created it love it," said Miranda, 29. "I grew up with Latin music and Broadway musicals in equal measure, so I use one to explore the other. That gives 'In the Heights' its authenticity."

A show that focuses on young Latino adults who live at the northern tip of Manhattan, "In the Heights" turned into a big, award-laden hit that made Miranda a star. It's his success, but it's not his life story.

Today, Washington Heights has the largest Dominican population in the United States. Many Cubans, Ecuadorians and Mexicans live there, too. The Miranda family, however, never lived there, though they did live nearby, in Inwood.

Miranda's father, who was born in Puerto Rico, is a political consultant; he was New York Mayor Ed Koch's assistant for Hispanic affairs. His mother, a clinical psychologist, is a musical-theater devotee who took her son to his first show, "Les Mis," when he was 7. (He fell asleep.)

Miranda wrote the first version of "In the Heights" nine years ago, while he was still a Wesleyan University undergrad. Compared with most college shows, this was a very big hit. Kids lined up around the block to get a seat. Two seniors, Neil Stewart and John Mailer (Norman Mailer's son), told Miranda they were going to start a theater company when they graduated and wanted to bring "In the Heights" to New York. He basically told them that would be very nice. He figured they were dreaming.

They were not.

In the course of remounting the show for New York, "In the Heights" underwent some changes. Miranda wrote lots of new songs; Quiara Alegria Hudes wrote a fresh book to tie the songs together; Thomas Kail became the director. And Miranda, already the show's creator, composer and lyricist, turned into its star.

That was never his plan, Miranda said. He began playing Usnavi, the owner of a tiny bodega, at rehearsals, just to fill in until Kail could find a "real" actor. It turned out Miranda was as real as it gets.

"I think of myself as an actor the way that Stephen Sondheim is an actor," he said. "Initially, you play every part in your show, when you write it.

"I put myself in all my characters' shoes. I talk to myself until it feels true, and then I write it down."