I think it's a decent enough guess and I'd give better then even odds on it.

Whales have the capacity to communicate. Stories are more effective than unadorned facts at being remembered (for humans anyways). Remembering important facts is a huge advantage in almost any context. The biggest jump imo is the second one, but I find it unlikely that whales would have a radically different memory storage and retrieval model than humans

There is nothing at all that hints to that though. It makes me think of people who believe their dogs can "smile" the same way humans do.

Humans are very good at two things, seeing patterns and projecting their own feelings/experiences on other living creatures (or inanimate objects even). We're the exception, not the norm.

You can't "guess" or rely on intuition for these topics, that's how we got religions, the geocentric system, &c.

Of course you can guess and rely on intuition. The key aspect of science is the feedback loop with data to refine/reject those guesses and intuition.

Its also hilarious to me that you call out my guess and then make your own unsubstantiated claims, which I'm sure feel "intuitive" to you.