I started writing fanfiction in the late 90's, back when it wasn't monitored and kids and teenagers were accessing all sorts of literary craziness. But, it's how I learned to write. The good, the bad, the ugly, I read and probably wrote all of it. My middle and high school years were marked by carrying a load of extra notebooks and printoffs of the stories I wrote. Towards the end of high school, I found various forums to post my stories on. I continued all through college, and even post studies. There's a few things still hanging out on FanFiction.net and AO3 that can be attributed to me.
I struggled, though, to create my own characters, aside from FOC's. That was easy. Developing anything else was where I lacked any confidence. I knew if I wanted to go anywhere as a writer, I would have to eventually break out of that habit, and start venturing into character creation on my own. The more I wrote, the easier it got.
January 2017. I had been toying with the idea of putting pen to paper on a story I started my senior year of high school, in 2004. It was May, and school was ending. I created a character who was an up and coming drummer, and created a fanfiction for her. 2004, 2005, 2006, the series blossomed. By about 2007, life had just gotten too much, and a lot of my writing went by the wayside. After a lot of time away, online roleplaying with a close friend, and discussion with my now exhusband, I figured why not? I had created a new part of this story, and felt like I had enough "life" under my belt now to try again. So I did.
The first story was completed just shy of 2 years. I finally took that leap of faith into creating my own story, while paying respects to the music, actors, and pop culture that had inspired so many stories and ideas over the years. It wasn't as hard as I used to think it was, and I've rather enjoyed the process. It took a long time to make that leap.
So here's to writing, creating, music, love, and the craziness that humanity pursues.