How do you start to use Rootschat?

[cilycoed]

I have gone round and round in circles, trying to find where I can post my genealogy, and am really stuck. I have looked for the buttons by the forums, but can't find the forums. I keep going back to the Beginners posting, but how on earth do I post, and how does one contact Rootsweb?  Someboby please help!

Cilycoed

[PrueM]

Hi Cilycoed, and welcome to Rootschat! 

Sorry you seem to be having a bit of trouble using the site, but once you get to know your way around it's quite easy 

As you are reading this message, look up above the list of messages and you'll see a 'tree' starting with "Rootschat.com" then "Beginners" etc.  Click on the "Rootschat.com" heading and you'll be taken to a new page that will show you all the boards that are available.

All you have to do to get started is to click on one of the boards that you think will be useful to you (for example, one of the county boards under "England") and post a "New Topic" there with your enquiry on it 

Rootschat is primarily a forum for people to ask and answer questions about their genealogy and family history, and related topics.  We don't like names of living people (apart from yourself of course!) posted on the boards for privacy reasons - for example, people who were adopted might want to know how to contact their birth mother - but that's one of the few restrictions we have.  You can read more about the do's and don'ts on the "help" page (link is at the very top of your screen, in a row of buttons).

There are also some useful links at the top of the "Beginners" board.

I hope that helps you to get started!  Don't worry if you need to ask lots of questions to get going - we all had to start somewhere!

Cheers
Prue 

[kiwihalfpint]

Hi Cilycoed,

Welcome to Rootschat from me.   There are lots of excellent researchers here, so as Prue says, ask as many questions, give as much information that you have so the researchers can help you with your search.

Best of all have fun.

Cheers
KHP

[Ruskie]

Hi Cilycoed!

Not too sure if I understand the problem but I'll try to help.  

Well, for a start you just did post a question on "beginners".

If you wish to ask questions about a specific family that you are researching, you should ask that question in the appropriate section - if you look at the top of the page where you see the words WELCOME, HOME, HELP, Shop etc etc. and click on WELCOME, go towards the bottom of this page and you will see all the Rootschat categories. If your research is in England, click on England - this will take you to a page listing the specific counties - you can then select the county and then select "lookup requests" and post your question.

If you click on HOME, there are sections for 'beginners' and 'how to use rootschat' which give lots of help and are well worth reading.

If you are looking to put your genealogy research onto the rootsweb site, then you will need to go to rootsweb (not rootschat):
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/
Afraid I can't help you any further with that, but there appears to be a 'help' section.

Good luck.

PS. I see Prue and KHP have beaten me to it, but I will post this reply anyway ....

[charlotteCH]

Hi cilycoed,  Welcome to Rootschat.

When you do post a question may I suggest you try, if possible, to include three things-1.  as full a name as you know with the surname in CAPITALS,          
                     2.  some date/s if you know any- birth, marriage/death sort of thing and
                    3. a place/location if you know where the person was about whom you are seeking help.

This maximises your chances of getting good info from lookups..
charlotte