[jp4m2]

Originally Posted by abbie's mom

OK now, let's just try this not-being-invisible thing out:

One bee in my bonnet is the use of people's names. Or, the lack thereof, I should say. I've been a member here, what - two years? And, I do try to be involved as a contributing member with what little I can (making avatars, a YT memorial page) and only two people actually address me by my name. Now, I can see using usernames when we don't know people, or it's not in their siggie...but, those of us who have our real name in our sig line obviously are fine with it being used. Seeing your name, especially when one has almost 2,000 posts makes one feel more like a member of the community, as opposed to - Reply to: username(fill in the blank). When replying to posts, I try to take the extra second or two to see if the poster has their name in their sig line, and address them thusly - making it more personal. I've felt strongly enough about this that I've regretted my registration choice and have been thinking about closing this account and opening an account as 'ada & abigail'. If I'd known what super people are here, and that I'd be sticking around, I'd probably have registered that way in the first place. But...hindsight is always clearer than the road ahead.

So, anyway....I propose that one way to help the forum feel more like a community is to address people by their names, when we know they don't mind. And, just for the 'official' record:

All y'all (that's inclusive of everyone) have permission to call me ada!

Ada, I agree with this also, I tried to use their real name because it gives a more personal feeling, but this was my problem...I look at their sig. and there might be 3 or 4 names all run together, it was hard to tell if their name was included in the sig....I think I called them by their dogs name, now I'm afraid to use the names, so I'm back to using the user name ....