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Marella attended [[Thomas Jefferson High School (Rochester, New York)|Jefferson High School]] in [[Rochester, New York]], becoming a standout athlete in [[American football|football]], [[Scholastic wrestling|amateur wrestling]], and [[track and field]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|last=Von Slagle|first=Stephen|date=June 4, 2020|title=Gorilla Monsoon|url=https://historyofwrestling.com/gorilla-monsoon/|access-date=November 19, 2021|website=History of Wrestling}}</ref> At the time, he weighed over 300 pounds (136 kg) and was affectionately called "Tiny" by his teammates.
Marella was also a standout athlete after [[high school]] at [[Ithaca College]] in [[Ithaca, New York]]. He continued to wrestle, now weighing over 350 pounds, and took second in the
Marella's size and athletic ability attracted the attention of New York promoter Pedro Martinez, and he went to wrestle for Martinez after graduating from Ithaca in 1959. Gorilla was 6'5" and weighed around 330 pounds when he first started wrestling professionally. By the end of his career, he was up around 375 pounds, although he had weighed as much as 440 pounds at points.{{Citation needed|reason=Citation required per [[WP:V]]|date=November 2022}}
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Marella was married to his wife, Maureen, for more than 40 years and had three children: Sharon (born 1960), [[Joey Marella|Joey]] (1963–1994), and Valerie (born 1966). [[Víctor Quiñones]] (1959–2006) was listed in Gorilla's obituary as his son as well.<ref name="NYT">{{cite book|title=The New York Times Biographical Service|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NXgoAQAAIAAJ|date=October 1999|publisher=[[Arno Press]]|page=1,552|first=Nick|last=Ravo}}</ref>
On July 4, 1994, his son, Joey Marella, fell asleep at the wheel and died in a car accident on the [[New Jersey Turnpike]], while returning from refereeing a WWF event in [[Ocean City, Maryland]]. He was not wearing a seatbelt at the time of the crash.<ref name=":0" /> Fellow WWF employee [[Mike Chioda]] later commented that Marella was "heartbroken" about his son's death.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://itrwrestling.com/news/mike-chioda-gorilla-monsoon-his-sons-death/|title = Mike Chioda Recalls Helping Gorilla Monsoon Following His
In early 1994, Marella co-hosted the short-lived morning variety/game show ''Bingo Break'' on [[WBFF]] in Baltimore, Maryland, which also featured fellow WWF on-air personality [[Sean Mooney]] as the bingo caller. The program did not acknowledge Marella's wrestling career, and as such he was billed on-camera as Bob Marella rather than as Gorilla Monsoon.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://wrestlecrap.com/inductions/bingo-break/|title = Induction: Bingo Break - and Bob Marella was his name-o|date = 14 May 2019}}</ref>
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