I have been listening to this song for longer than I have been on this earth.
However, listening now today, the meaning has transformed from it's past the present. This is partially because of the piece of triva, which I discovered thanks to a certain profile on Youtube from Dumpster0101 - who states the following :
"When a Man Loves a Woman - is a song recorded by Percy Sledge in 1966 at Norala Sound Studio in Sheffield, Alabama. It made number one on both the Billboard Hot 100 and R&B singles charts. It was listed 54th in the List of Rolling Stone magazine's 500 greatest songs of all time. The sidemen for this recording included Spooner Oldham, organ; Marlin Greene, guitar; Albert "Junior" Lowe, bass and Roger Hawkins, drums. The song is credited to Calvin Lewis and Andrew Wright, who played bass and keyboards with Sledge. However, the song was in fact written by Percy Sledge himself, but he gave it to Lewis and Wright.".
Apparently - before the recording session, the song had no title or lyrics. The session proceeded with the expectation that Sledge would produce them for the vocal takes. When it came time to record the vocals, Sledge improvised the lyrics with minimal pre-planning, using the melody as a guide for rhythm and phrasing.
The performance was so convincing that others working on the session assumed Sledge had the lyrics written down.
Knowing it was gifted, and improvised, makes it even more monumental. The older meaning and association, takes a lower position within this disk.