A long-time gamer, and even longer time RPG lover, it was love at first play with World of Warcraft.

Coming to Azeroth
When World of Warcraft initially came out, I was too caught up in exploring the also-new Everquest II; having been an Everquest player and fan since 2001. Months later, however, I started looking up information on WoW after a compelling article in a gaming magazine we subscribed to, and by that afteroon I'd bought and installed the game. For the next few months I spent as much time as I could in Azeroth. I was in love.

Though I still love and play EQII, I now devote my time between it and WoW (and The Sims, but that's another genre).

Geeky Girl Gamer
One of my earliest, and best, memories was my parents setting me up to play my own little four-person group on Ultima III: Exodus on the family's Atari 800. I spent hours just deciding what classes would compromise my group, and what the perfect name would be for each.

Over twenty years later, not much has changed. I drive my boyfriend up the wall with my painstaking and fretful decisions on race/class comboes and then spend at least an hour (usually more), pouring over my fantasy name books for the "perfect name".

Lucky me - I grew grown up around games and the fantasy genre. My parents, when we were young, played D&D with a group of friends monthly, and we often got to pour through the books and watch Dad paint miniatures. Fantasy movies were big in our house, and I remember, distinctly, seeing movies such as The Beastmaster, the Conan movies and cartoon movies like The Last Unicorn and The Hobbit. My favorite Saturday morning cartoon was, naturally, the short-lived Dungeons & Dragons. I like to think that a healthy enjoyment of mysterious other worlds and beings helped give birth to the wild imagination that spurs my writing and creative spirit today.

Playing RPG games comes naturally, too. From the groundbreaking Ultima III: Exodus to Nintendo's Ultima: Exodus, which took me (and the whole family) to logging massive hours on Diablo on our first computer in 1997. As our computer system, and the games improved, my brother moved on to Everquest, which he had me join in 2001. My sister and mother, however, didn't like the "online" aspect, and continued to play games like Dungeon Siege and Diablo II (yes, I know, I have the coolest family).

In the RP genre, I've moved on to play, also, Neverwinter Nights, Everquest II and, of course, World of Warcraft. I play some other games but, other than Sims, most of game-time is spent playing RPGs.

And, hence, my life as a girl gamer.