Introduction From Chicago - Jim

You accidentally hit the 'enter' button twice ? No harm done,

Peter

Jim,

Welcome to the forum! There are a lot of helpful people here.

The best way to learn how to use the forum is to start posting! If I have a general question, I do a quick search on some key words. If I can't find what I'm looking for, I start a new thread.

Like all forums, conversations tend to wander. There isn't any penalty for asking a previously asked question. Someone will quickly point it out. We won't shave your head and take away your birthday!

Dan

Jim,

I too have never belonged to any other forum. But no need for fears. If you ask a question that's already been addressed, someone will provide a link to that thread, and do so without reproaching you for not finding it yourself. If you post a question to the wrong forum, management will move it for you. Again without reproaching you. The only thing that seems to aggravate some members is when someone appears focused on making money out of stamps and wants the forum to say that he's hit the jackpot. And then keeps doing it. Such a person may be reminded that we're collecting stamps, not mining for gold. But for help and advice on how to identify and collect, members here are extraordinarily generous. As a relatively new user, I have mainly asked for that help and advice when I ran into problems of identification. I've only occasionally tried to help someone else by putting in my two cents. I'm really not advanced enough to do much more. So, in general, I'd say that you should just go ahead and post any question you may have about a particular stamp or about methods of collecting and storing. For a particular stamp, however, it's important to post a good scan. Your question will be hard to answer if members can't see the stamp, and photos are usually not good enough.

As for your other question about problems when trying to post: I once was told my post was a duplicate reply, because I had in fact hit submit twice. Other than that, I'm not sure what to say. For the most part, I prepare a submission in Word, then copy it to the forum, so as not to risk timing out—or submitting something full of typos or just plain foolish.

For now my advice is to take a stamp that's giving you trouble and submit a post (with scan) that describes your problem. You'll quickly get the help you need. Do so often and you'll soon be quite comfortable.

Eric

Aw Dan, threaten me with a good time!
As long as I can trust that somebody will point it out to me, I continue to ask away.
Thanks for the info. Peter.
Thanks for the heads-up EMaxim, sounds perfectly reasonable to to me. I'm not near nor will I be in that position. All of this information is very helpful.
I will ask my first question later today about Thurn und Taxis.
Cheers!
JIM

First off, welcome.

Second, if you decide to collect Ecuador as part of South America, let me know; can likely help you there.