They Told Me Not To Talk To Strangers Online....

Hey Nutterettes, 

Niki here again... I'm here to talk about something that is close to my heart. Talking to "strangers" online. 

As a child, I was always told not to talk to strangers online as they could be anyone and you don't know who you are talking to. Of course, this is true but what is also true, is that some of my best friends are people that I have met online - some I've never even met. But where is the line between a stranger and an online friend? I would definitely say the main one is how long you've known each other and what you actually know about the person. 

For me, it all started in 2007, November 4 to be exact. I decided that I was going to join the Harry Potter roleplay fandom on bebo... Yep you read that right, I can't believe that I've actually been roleplaying online now for almost ten years. My first character was Gemini Black, daughter to Regulus Black. Even back then, Manda and I were really close and she actually joined the roleplay community with me that day with my character's cousin Kaylie. Most of the people that I met through that account I've lost contact with as we only really spoke on there, I think the only one that I really talk to still would be Kirsty who roleplayed another cousin. 

From there, many accounts got made and forgotten about, I don't really remember anyone I made friends with on those accounts... The next main account for me on bebo would be a crossover account made in Summer 2008, it was mainly Harry Potter still but I decided to use the characters from a series of books called Mates, Dates by Cathy Hopkins. As well as being a crossover account, it was also a multi-character account - how many exactly I can’t remember but there was a constant stream of more characters being added to that account. From there, I have two friends that I still constantly talk to… Becka and Ria.  It’s hard to believe that I have now known these two girls for nine years, there’s so much that we’ve been through together and they are both like sisters to me even though I haven’t met Becka in real life though. I’ve stayed with Ria many times since 2011. I remember that we would cause so much shit and drama for our characters that we said we would need to start attending DAA (drama addicts anonymous) meetings.

For a few years, I would go around making accounts and roleplaying with different people. After a while, I stopped roleplaying as it was starting to die out on bebo and I didn’t know where else to roleplay it at that point. In 2013, I came across a group on Facebook where people were roleplaying from Les Miserables through pages. I met some amazing people through this group, from all over the world and most of them I have never met; actually I have only met two of the girls (Alex and Liz) since they lived only an hour away on the train! Around 2014, I moved to making Facebook accounts for the roleplay characters and since then; I have been a part of many different fandoms. It was during my time in the Once Upon A Time fandom that I met one of the other girls that I have became rather close to, Abii. We’ve met up a couple of times, the first time being when she had come up to Glasgow and the second being my 21st birthday when we were both at Alton Towers at the same time. The most recent friend that I have made online would have to be Alex, I really don’t know what my life would be like without having her in it even though we’ve not actually met yet. I think we’ve known each other now about two years but honestly, I can’t remember exactly but in a way, that shows just how strong this friendship has become because of how close we are and that I struggle to think of her not being in my life. We met through the Harry Potter Facebook fandom - honestly no matter how many fandoms I end up going to for short periods of time, I always find myself returning there. 

I’m not saying that you should go and tell everyone all about you, but if you do find yourself talking to someone and you end up getting closer, remember that not everyone you meet online are going to be strangers. The way I see it; 

Strangers are just friends that you haven’t met yet.

So what about you guys? Have you ever made friends online that you've ended up meeting or even not meeting? 

NikiNutter x