The tragic slain victims of the gay-bar massacre in Colorado Springs ranged from a married mom and social worker to a resilient trans woman who was visiting the nightspot for the first time.

The five murdered people were at Club Q on a night marking the annual Transgender Day of Remembrance — which is held to honor victims of violent hate.

Anderson Aldrich, 22, has been arrested for the attack, and is expected to be charged with murder and hate crimes.

Here is what we know about those killed in Saturday’s senseless rampage:

The 28-year-old transgender man from Tulsa, Okla., knew he was different at an early age, dressing as a boy and defiantly withstanding the teasing that came along with it — although at a cost, his mother recalled.

“He was miserable,’’ and losing weight over the stress, Sabrina Aston said of her son Daniel.

But that didn’t stop the young man, who went on to proudly become president of the LGBTQ club at his college, Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Okla.

Two years ago, Daniel moved to Colorado Springs, where his parents had settled, and began working at Club Q.

He toiled as a bartender and a particularly energetic stage entertainer — appreciating what a haven the bar was in the relatively conservative community for those labeled different like himself, his shattered mom said.

“He lit up a room, always smiling, always happy and silly,” Sabrina Aston said.

She said she learned about the attack around 2 a.m. Sunday when one of her son’s friends called to say Daniel had been shot. She and her husband rushed to the local hospital, where she gave detectives a description of her son’s tattoos, including one on his left arm of a heart with “Mom’” written on it and an arrow through it.

The parents were sent home without word on their son ’til authorities knocked on their door hours later and told them their boy was dead.

“I keep thinking it’s just, it’s a mistake, they’ve made a mistake and that he’s really alive,’’ the mom said. “It’s just a nightmare that you can’t wake up from.

“They were doing, like, a celebration of life for those people that had died,” she noted of Club Q revelers Saturday. “And instead, they lost their lives.”

The 40-year-old trans woman had been the victim of violent hate before — but she seemed to be hoping that was all behind her on her first visit to Club Q on Saturday night.

Natalie Skye Bingham told the New York Times that pal Kelly Loving Face-Timed her a few minutes before the deadly shooting to show off how she looked in her newly colored red hair and a black skirt and black top.

“It was nice to see her so confident in herself,” Bingham said.

“It was so relieving to know that she felt beautiful that night” after a bout of depression and a history of being violently attacked.

Loving’s sister, Tiffany Loving, described her sibling as “just a caring person.”

“She was loving, always trying to help the next person out, instead of thinking of herself,” Tiffany told the Times.

Bingham could vouch for that.

She said she had met Kelly about seven years ago at a Florida club where they both worked at the time.

“When I first started to transition, I wasn’t confident at all,” Bingham recalled. “She reminded me that you are not doing the wrong thing by being trans, that it was OK to embrace it because you are a beautiful person.

“Without her giving me the confidence, I don’t know where I would be today.”

Married mom and social worker Ashley Paugh, 35, and a female friend were at Club Q to see a comedian perform.

The pair thought it would be a fun way to cap off their day trip to Colorado Springs after driving up from La Junta, Colo.

“It just doesn’t seem real,” Paugh’s sister, Stephanie Clark, told NBC News of her sibling’s death.

Her sister said Ashley “lived for her daughter,’’ who is 11 and just “devastated’’ by her mom’s horrific death.

“We’re heartbroken. We’re sad. We’re mad, angry,” Clark said of the situation.

Paugh’s widower, Kurt Paugh, said in a statement to KKTV, “Ashley was a loving wife — she was my high school sweetheart — and she was just an amazing mother.

“She had a huge heart,” he said. “I know that Ashley cared about so many people. She helped so many people through her work at Kids Crossing, a nonprofit that helps find loving homes for foster children.

“She would do anything for the kids — traveling all over southeastern Colorado, from Pueblo and Colorado Springs to Fremont County and the Colorado border, working to raise awareness and encourage individuals and families to become foster parents to children in our community.

“This included working with the LGBTQ community to find welcoming foster placements for children.

“During the holidays, Ashley organized giving trees and delivered them to businesses so that foster kids could have brighter holidays — and in fact, she was setting up giving trees even last week, canvassing Pueblo and Colorado Springs.”

He didn’t just work at Club Q, he was the embodiment of the bar, Derrick Rump’s grieving friends said.

The 38-year-old bartender — known for blasting tunes by Britney Spears — was beloved for making everyone who walked through the door feel at home, pal and former co-worker Shadavia Green told the Times.

“He genuinely loved Club Q. He was the bar,” Green said.

Rump, a native of Berks County, Pa., and a Colorado College grad, had a heart bigger than a house, too, friends told the Washington Post.

When some of the drag performers couldn’t afford things for their outfits, including fake eyelashes, he would dig into his own pocket and buy them, they said.

When the performers lost their jobs at one point, he paid for their groceries for two months.

“Every time I saw him, he was always positive and extremely kind,” customer Anthony Kichton told the site of Rump, who had worked at the bar about five years before he was killed.

Another bar patron, Kayla Rene Cortes, said the club is “never going to be the same.’’

He was another first-timer to Club Q on Saturday when he went there with his longtime girlfriend, her parents and their friends to celebrate a birthday.

Raymond Green Vance, a 22-year-old Chicago native, had lived in Colorado Springs most of his life and was clearly on his way to doing good things, his family told the Times.

“He couldn’t wait to save enough money to get his own apartment,’’ his tearful family said in a statement.

He had just gotten a new job at a FedEx distribution center and “was thrilled to have received his first paycheck.’’

But the joyful outing turned bloody, and his girlfriend, Kassy Fierro, later wrote on Facebook, “I’ll never be able to heal from this.”

“I want to wake up from this horrendous nightmare,’’ she said, according to the Denver Post. “u didnt deserve this. u are the brightest light. u made everyones life so much better.”

His proud, distraught family added in its statement, “He was a 2018 graduate of Sand Creek High School” where his mother describes him as a popular, well-liked young man who never got into any trouble and had plenty of friends.

“Raymond spent most of his spare time with his girlfriend (whom he had been with since middle school) and playing video games, which were his favorite hobby and something he hoped to turn into an online career.”

“Raymond grew up surrounded by cousins whom he was very close with, and they and the rest of his tight-knit family are still trying to come to terms with the fact he is gone.
His absence will leave irreparable heartbreak in countless lives.”

With Post wires