Well, that was a pleasant surprise, alanabit (And here is a link to my song website, if anyone is curious - http://members.lycos.co.uk/mfinger/)

One thing a lot of people who write songs agree about is that, most of the time you write a song you are pleased with, it's not so much that you wrote it, you almost caught it as it passed by. You hear a phrase, or it pops into your head, which probably means you heard it, and it chimes in with something you were wanting to say, and it builds from there.

When you have something you want to say, you might do it in different ways - you might write a song; or you might write a poem, or a story, or a letter to a friend, or post something here - and any of those might turn into a song.

I find using the computer handy these days. By that I mean, I'll have a line or a couplet and I know it'll come in somewhere, so I put it down, and then maybe work towards it; and then I can pick up the end and make it the beginning, or the other way around, and spot some lines that might make a chorus. And perhaps the line that bit started off from won't be there at the end of it after all.

And it's a good idea, I think, not to pick up an instrument until the song is shaped and the tune formed. Both might change later. But I think it's a mistake to take your lead from a musical instrument.