If you've ever done yoga, raise your foot. Over your head. And if you've ever done yoga in a room with wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling mirrors like I have, maybe you've found it pretty darn hard to keep a straight face. That's why when I heard there was going to be a "laughter yoga" class at the Eola Road Branch of the Aurora Public Library, it wasn't such a stretch for me to imagine a class full of people in yoga positions laughing their heads off.

So I showed up to the recent event with a pen and notebook in one hand and a camera in the other, which always gets me off the hook of actually participating in anything that might be even mildly embarrassing. Here are some things about the class, led by certified laughter yoga leader Caryl Derenfeld, that did not surprise me:

The class was attended by 28 people, and only one was a man. Derenfeld has one of those wide smiles that immediately causes others to break into a grin, meaning that before you even begin, you're halfway to laughing, making her job loads easier. Derenfeld gave the class members permission to "fake it" if they didn't really feel like laughing.

These things did surprise me:

There were no yoga positions. There was no talking by participants. There was no holding back -- everyone participated loudly and boisterously and with huge amounts of enthusiasm. Some of the participants had attended laughter yoga classes in the past, so they were really unabashed in their enjoyment.

They already knew what Derenfeld had said at the beginning of the class was true:

"Even if you feel great now, you'll feel even better when you leave." (Laughter is believed to aid breathing, increase circulation, relieve stress, reduce pain by raising endorphin levels and elevate mood by giving the mind a rest.)

Just like regular yoga, laughter yoga is all about the breath. It's important to take deep inhalations and exhalations. But laughter yoga throws clapping and belly laughs into the mix. And in a huge departure from regular yoga, which usually is a solitary experience, laughter yoga majors on communication among class members through eye contact and smiles.

"You don't need to be a comedian or feel funny," Derenfeld told the class. "Fake it if you have to."

Dr. Madan Kataria launched the first Laughter Yoga Club in a Mumbai park in March 1995, and there are now clubs in more then 60 countries, Derenfeld said.

After a good half-hour of laughing, clapping, the mimed drinking of laughter milkshakes and prancing about the room, Derenfeld ended the class with a nice, long "savasana" -- also known as "corpse" -- a pose which at that point seemed kind of funny as well, in a morbid sort of way.

This is where I put the camera and the pen and notebook down and decided to join in the class. Yes, that would be me, avoiding the workout part of class and getting all involved in the relaxation part.

Before dismissing the class, Derenfeld asked how everyone was feeling.

"Good," "Relaxed," "Happy," "Loose," were some of the answers. And then of course there were the jokes about the 27 "loose" women in the room.

"If you want to continue laughing every day," Derenfeld advised, "you need to laugh for about 15 minutes straight. It's easy to laugh alone. You get up, take a shower, towel off and look in the mirror." Or, if like me you're not that energetic, you just fake it.