Everyone who looks into this thread for hints about how to play ~ including Barb who started the thread plus a whole lot of others ~ will pick and choose what to print out and study and what to ignore. Some readers will find some contributions most helpful for themselves, while others will find a completely different set of messages the most useful for them.

So, there's no need for us to criticize each other's approaches. Each contributor will probably appeal to a slightly different set of readers.

I like MTed, and have had several very fruitful PM exchanges with him. I know that he's always going to be more insistent than I am about the need for personal instruction, and I respectfully disagree, which (I trust) he understands.

I would contend that well-written tablature can convey every bit as much information as standard musical notation and more (insofar as it shows not only the note to be played, but how and where to play each note). In any event, parallel lines of tablature and standard notation ~ a common enough approach ~ should convey all possible musical information.

That said, I'm too worried about a bit of tab's potential failure to convey the subtlest rhythmic information. The only songs I have ever tried to learn from tablature (or by any other method) are ones that that I had heard. The only reason most of us ever have for wanting to learn a song is that we heard it and liked it! When you know how a song goes, you should have some idea about the basic rhythmic approach, etc. (e.g., whether it's a shuffle, etc.)