PACIFIC GROVE, California (Reuters) - An aviation official investigating the airplane crash that killed country-pop star John Denver said the singer bought his experimental plane just one day before its fatal crash. Denver, the boyish, upbeat singer famed for such infectious songs as "Rocky Mountain High" and "Thank God I`m a Country Boy," died on Sunday evening when the experimental Long-EZ plane he was piloting nosedived into the Pacific Ocean and disintegrated on impact. Denver`s body was severely dismembered in the crash, and authorities could not positively identify the singer until fingerprint records were flown in on Monday from his home in Colorado. It took until Monday evening for emergency workers to retrieve all of Denver`s major body parts, including his head. George Petterson, an official with the National Transportation Safety Board, told a news conference that investigators were trying to piece the aircraft back together and were months away from determining a cause for the crash. Denver flew on Saturday to Santa Maria from Colorado to take delivery of the experimental airplane. An experienced pilot, Denver then flew the Long-EZ to Monterey, the picturesque town where he maintained a home. Lt. David Allard, a spokesman for the Monterey County Sheriff`s Office, said the reults of an autopsy showed that the official cause of death was multiple blunt force trauma and that death was instantaneous. Denver made three quick take-offs and landings and then asked airport officials for permission to go for a full flight. Officials in the control tower granted him permission but asked him to turn on his transponder code, a device that allows planes to be tracked on radar screens. The transponder did not appear to be working and officials asked Denver to turn it off and on. His last words to the control tower were: "Do you have it now?" Moments later, officials lost the plane`s signal. Denver reached the peak of his fame in the 1970s as a singer who moved between country, folk and pop music. Among his best known

hits were "Rocky Mountain High," "Take Me Home, Country Roads" and "Annie`s Song," written for his wife, from whom he was divorced.