That was great!
I don’t get the hammer though.
-FrL-
Mario’s first appearance was on Donkey Kong, see here. He’d grab the hammer and smash barrels coming at him. It’s probably also a joke about the Hammer & Sickle.
I’ll shuffle back off to my rocking chair now.
No, no. See here!
I’ll just chime in to say that having bought Super Mario Bros. for the Wii’s Virtual Console, I haven’t gotten to world 7-4 because I keep using the warp zones to jump straight to world 8. 
Don’t forget: UP UP DOWN DOWN LEFT RIGHT LEFT RIGHT B A SELECT START for two-player enjoyment.