Vulgar; Stringsinger; PoppaGator and Ashley:

MANY Thanks for all the pointers, tips and comments.

It'll be a while before I can wear my playing like an "old comfortable coat" I think.

I also agree that my ambition level often runs away with my technical level, so I'm always trying pieces that are too hard for where I'm at currently.

The "learning by rote" is at the moment the only way I can do more complex stuff, and it takes me ages ( I love Will Fly's YouTube teaching vids...but often need to step through them one frame at a time to slow down the picking demos to a speed where my brain can process them :-) )

The speed thing's another failing that I need to work on...I'm impatient, so rather than practice very slowly until I've got a good rhythm and a precise tune, I'll speed up as soon as it sounds "OK-ish" and then wonder why the fingering/ picking precision goes all to pot.

So much to learn, so little time...............