But I’m Not a Techie…

When I was first presented with the opportunity to write for HeroPress, my initial reaction was; “Why? What could I possibly say to help people more experienced than I am at WordPress?” You see, I’ve only been using WordPress for a little more than a year, and I only use it for blogging. The only thing I remember how to do really is update things, change my theme, and make my own header. Still, I thought about it and my family helped me realize that even if I can’t tell people why WordPress is awesome, I still relate to it in a special way. Without WordPress, I wouldn’t be writing at all really.

Before WordPress:

Before WordPress I’d written practically nothing. I’d started a book, sure, wrote a few short stories here and there, but that’s it. Whenever I used the computer, it was for online gaming. I suppose I should mention that I’ve kind of got a thing for that. Anyway, less than a year ago my family decided to go to WordCamp Chicago. Even before I knew a single thing about WordPress, I found WordCamps fun, mostly because I helped out my local WordCamp, which had involved a lot of sitting and playing my 3DS. So my family was sitting at the table, talking about WCCHI when my mom told us the one condition for us going; my sibling and I had to work with our dad to make our own blogs.

The idea itself of a blog actually sounded pretty fun to me at the time, but what I thought I’d be doing was hundreds of hours of college grade math, then getting on with the rest of my school work and having NO time on my hands. In truth it took about a few hours of one day for the site to be built (with NO math), then all I was required to do was fiddle with things until the site was exactly to my liking and I understood just what was sitting in my little menu as far as tools.

After WordPress:

My family was on our way to WCCHI and I hadn’t posted a single thing. However, my mind was a buzz of happiness as I thought about everything I’d be able to do with it. Like I said before, it wasn’t the idea of having a blog I didn’t like, it was the idea of building it myself. So my first night of WCCHI, I pulled out my dad’s laptop and wrote my first post, plain and simple. Then the next week I wrote another one, then another one next week. I was really getting into this writing thing.

Then, a few months later, my family was sitting at a restaurant talking about this and that, when I brought up an idea I’d had of what I would do if I could make a video game in one of my favorite series. After hearing it, my dad said, “You should blog about that.” You see, at the time I used my blog mostly for talking about my favorite video games. I realized my dad was right, but I also knew that it wouldn’t get off the ground very well if all I had was the beginning of it. So I started thinking about it, and the more I thought about the more story I got, until I saw I could turn this into something more than a video game synopsys. So I started writing it as a book, publishing it chapter by chapter on my blog.

Now I’d been somewhat dedicated before then, but with the start of my first story, my interest only escalated. No longer was I the girl who’d written part of a book with a pencil and floral notebook, I was the girl who was writing a blog full of stories, thoughts, and fun. My writing even impacted a friend, and together we started writing an online series. Not only do I enjoy writing on my blog, but I also love that because of it I have something to talk about when I go to my dad’s work-related parties, or meet his work friends. When people talk to me, I don’t just make small talk anymore, because now I actually have something to break the ice with them.

Thinking back to before WordPress, I guess you could say I was a writer, but after WordPress my entire life changed. I’m now aspiring to write as a full-time profession, and it’s all because of that few hours I took with my dad to build my blog. Everyone else here on HeroPress might be experienced workers and people of the world, but not everyone who uses WordPress is someone fabulous who’s using it to build ten plugins a day for ten blogs each. Some of us who use it are simply looking to put our words and thoughts into the world, which in this day and age IS the internet. So, I was right in the fact that I have very little to tell the people of WordPress who know much more than I, but that’s not who I’m talking too. I’m talking to all the people who think that it’d be fun to be a writer, or are looking for something new in their lives.

WordPress isn’t just for techies, it’s easy to use and free of charge. There are plenty of ways to adjust it to your liking, and it takes very little time to set up. If you think you want a blog, start with this, it could just change your life.