I know this is not a HLTM teaching forum, but anyway..

I'd be grateful if someone could point me to a link to a primer on writing simple HTML source code for writing straight into the message box of a posting.

What I would like to do is occassionally just add bold and change colour to any one line or word, by using the appropriate simple HTML code.

I get all sorts of inconsistant things happening simply because I don't know the ground rules and the colours always are expressed as hex numbers!

For example, note the following three lines.Yes I can get bold text but...

line1

line2

line3

why is there blank lines between my lines?
It does not seem to make any sense! Though I note it's the same in Word when you choose to create a Web Page.

the above three lines was typed in as below(replace the ( & ) with acsii characters 60 & 62 respectively.
(P)line1
(B)(P)line2(/B)
(P)line3(/P)

For those puzzled by this, if you go to Menu View Source with this posting open, you'll get a notepad window pop up with the following display.

Note that ascii characters 60 & 62 replaced with ( & ).

(HTML)(HEAD)(TITLE)Message Preview(/TITLE)
(/HEAD)(BODY BGCOLOR="#CCCC99" TEXT="#000000")
(H1 ALIGN=CENTER)Message Preview(/H1)(P)Below, you can see how your message will look. (STRONG)The message has (EM)not(/EM) been posted yet!(/STRONG) This is merely a preview screen. If everything looks as you intended, hit the "Post Message" button below. Otherwise, use the "Back" button on your browser to return to the input form.
(P)(CENTER)(FORM METHOD=POST ACTION="http://www.ztw3.com/archive/003/archive.cgi?post" TARGET=_self)
(INPUT TYPE=HIDDEN NAME=PrevConfirm VALUE=10669)
(INPUT TYPE=SUBMIT VALUE="Post Message")
(/FORM)(/CENTER)(/P)
(H1 ALIGN=CENTER)ffff(/H1)
(P ALIGN=CENTER)(STRONG)Posted By: (BIG)Steve Rawling(/BIG) <(A HREF="mailto:srawling@bigpond.com")srawling@bigpond.com(/A)>
(BR)Date: Jul 3,2000 at 06:01
(/STRONG)(/P)(FONT )
(P)
(P)line1
(BR)(B)
(P)line2(/B)
(P)line3(/P)
(P)why is these blank lines between my lines?
(BR)It doesnot seem to make any sense!
(BR)(/P)(/FONT)
(P ALIGN=CENTER)(SMALL)(EM)ZTreeWin Forum is maintained by (A HREF="mailto:vico@ztw3.com")Victor Garcia(/A) with (A HREF="http://awsd.com/scripts/webbbs/" TARGET=_top)WebBBS 3.21(/A).(/EM)(/SMALL)(/P)
(/BODY)(/HTML)

or you can write a posting in Word as a web page. save as a html documnet. Then open with a text editor, then copy and paste to the forum posting message box.

the simple way, if ya in the know, is just type it in.

I'm not in the know..

So any help would be appreciated.

Ta..Steve