Goldman, who has been caring for kids with brain tumors for 20 years, regards Ryan and his family as examples of courage, compassion and kindness. Even with the outward signs of a tumor — his limp, paresis in his arm — Ryan didn't let his illness stop him.

Last week, they met for the first time since Ryan's death.

"It's not too often somebody calls your son a hero," she said.

She shared the same gregarious personality, eliciting grins from strangers at the grocery store, using the living room couch as her personal springboard.

He hoisted her like an airplane above his head, she giggled — later managed to seize his cell phone and send a text message — and the two played together as if they had known each other for years.

The families swapped stories of being afflicted with cancer so young. Walter expressed his hope to volunteer with Ryan's foundation and flipped through photos of his friend — cuddled in Spider-Man's arm at Disney World, decked out in a tux, peering up with his baby brown eyes.

"He inspired me to survive my cancer," said Walter, now 17, in remission and quite the football player and snowboarder. "Seeing him happy all the time made me happy. How could I be upset if he had it so much worse than me?"

When she read Walter's Facebook post in December describing Ryan as his inspiration, she was overcome with emotion.

After Ryan died, his parents spent nearly four years debating whether they should have another child and almost an additional year trying to get pregnant, Mary Lamantia said. When Sarah Ryann eventually made her way into this world, she shocked them by how much she acted like her brother.

Walter logged on right away and left this message: