Various storytellers find themselves the master of one form of storytelling and a failure at another. But at its very key -- at the heart of it all -- the desire to tell a creative story, to be heard, and to be appreciated for it becomes the entirety of what matters. What I refer to is human expression -- freedom of speech. We all desire to express ourselves, to be heard, see how others reflect on our viewpoints, and hope we are accepted.

Despite always getting high marks in "imagination" from teachers in all my early years, I finally started my creative writing process in the fourth grade. I had always been a good reader and enjoyed it greatly through the years, often reading well above my grade level. A love of reading can easily be turned into a love of writing, or so I believe. It all began with a simple superhero story -- I don't even remember the simplest parts of it or what the concept was, I'm sure it was quite primitive. Unfortunately, I didn't keep a copy of it.

I didn't really do much else with creative writing outside of classroom assignments until junior high school. There, I had an English teacher, who I sadly cannot remember the name of, who encouraged me to improve my writing. I'm not sure why she chose to devote extra time to help me out -- for that, I'll never know -- but she kindled that spark that had ignited so long ago yet was still just a small, glowing ember. She taught me to pay attention to details and to give more in a description than just "a big elephant." Granted, I was still in the early stages of my writing development but I learned a lot that year. My greatest piece that year was titled "A Day in the Life of King Arthur." My love of the Medieval fantasy genre already set in place.

She had inspired me to begin other work. I started a superhero story (which I am still working on to this day -- sad, isn't it?). There is a vast history to this character, which has undergone at least four re-writes at various stages of my life. I know I want to complete it someday -- but I keep changing my idea of who my target audience is and how to best reach them -- I've also changed the sub-genre several times. Other work from that time included a comic book series I wrote and drew (horribly, I might add!).

It was around that time that I started playing Dungeons & Dragons -- I found out that my budding writing talents could prove useful in such a game of the imagination. We had a hard time finding a sci-fi version after Gamma World and Star Frontiers died off -- and with the popularity of Star Wars, Transformers, Voltron and so forth, I created a d6-type system sci-fi roleplaying game with lasers, giant robot ships and so much more. At the age of 14 I had already created (though very rough by my current standards) my first functional role-playing game system. We played the game several times in the Boy Scouts but my time with the scouts grew short as I moved on to other things in school.

I started the second re-write of my superhero story (which would undergo a third re-write in college, a fourth re-write post-college, was abandoned for about 10 years, and have recently began the fifth and FINAL re-write on it -- I finally found the angle I was looking for). I also began writing the first draft of a book based off my sci-fi role-playing game. Though the title for that book has undergone several changes, the story itself has remained fairly in-tact -- in fact, during my college years I expanded it.

During high school, I started going to writing seminars, took extra writing classes, started journalism and photography studies, and studied mass media (including movies and TV). I fell in love with the whole communication process -- but my favorite part is storytelling. I also studied computer science, saw the early days of computer games when the stories were weak and needed vast improvement (today, major game stories often rival those in major motion pictures). It was then that I picked up ACS (Adventure Construction Set) which was the first computer roleplaying game creation program. I started to learn the art of storytelling through computer games.

In college, I picked up the newer version of ACS, released then for the PC rather than the old Apple II. I advanced my skills with it, as well. Later, Dungeons & Dragons would release Unlimited Dungeons for the PC, which I dabbled with. I studied journalism and photography and learned the art of telling true stories -- recording life, the human existence. I began the second re-write of my superhero story but then would stop work on it again as other stories began to develop.

I took a lot of computer science classes but didn't put much time into the game development hat -- it seemed like a world with a very limited employment list. Instead, I played Star Wars the roleplaying game (getting back in the pen-and-paper versions) and wrote adventures for it and ran a party of friends through that d6 version of the game.

One of my best friends ever, Kevin McClintock (also a journalist), encouraged my fiction writing -- he too shared my dreams of becoming a published fiction writer. We read each other's stuff and helped each other out. We also co-wrote a comedy-military piece about a bungling special forces group that seemed to accidentally solve its cases (in the tradition of The Pink Panther) but with a strong influence from the Mac Bolan and other more violent novels. Ironically enough, many of the jokes and satire we displayed in that work was similar to what would later be released by Matt Stone and Trey Parker in Team America.Unfortunately, Kevin and I never showed that work to anyone other than a small group of friends.

In addition, we also worked together on a horror short story collection about zombies. I still have my short stories from that as well as our comedy-military co-effort. I would have to say, Kevin was one of the biggest influences on my fiction writing as I worked on honing my skills in college.

Near the end of college, I began writing the expansion novels based on the sci-fi world I created for my roleplaying game. I completed one in a novella form my senior year -- I then went on to adapt it for my final project in a screenwriting class as if it were being produced for TV. This was an exciting time and I knew I had so much to look forward to. I was also reading a lot of writing how-to books, learning about voice, and improving my grammar skills.

Graduation came, I started my first newspaper job and began telling stories in Junction City, Kan., of all places. I wrote and shot photos for the daily newspaper there. Meanwhile, I began the third rewrite of my superhero story. My time in Junction City was short and I didn't complete the third rewrite.This would, in turn, prove to be problematic for the fourth re-write (problems I am only recently trying to solve).

I moved to Warrensburg, Mo., to work for the daily there and started playing Rolemaster the roleplaying game with some friends, plus the days of the Internet began and we started playing roleplaying games on the MUDs (multi-user domains). I didn't work on any of my writing in Warrensburg since my job there required a lot more writing of news events than the other newspapers I worked for. I also did a lot of photography there.

After a few more stop-offs at small newspapers, I ended up in Branson, Mo., as the photo editor for the Branson Daily News. I wrote stories, wrote a regular column (which was a lot of fun), and shot tons of photos. My skills in all respects were improving even in areas I had only dabbled before, such as page layout and headline writing.

My friends and I were still playing on the MUDs when I first came to Branson. During my three-year stay there, we moved from the MUDs, to Ultima Online, to Everquest. It was a great time for story-based games including Baldur's Gate and Diablo. We had a lot of fun and it was then that I first wished I was a computer game designer but had no idea of how to make that dream become a reality.

The lifestyle in Branson is a busy one. I had a lot of friends there (most of whom are still there) and it seemed like there was never time for fiction writing or working on projects. My gaming friends from Warrensburg and I did start building our own MUD for a while before quitting and going to Ultima Online. The problem was the cost of running the MUD and the necessary time it would take the four of us to keep it going and creative. Needless to say, not everyone held up their end of the bargain either financially or timewise and our own MUD ended up going the way of the [insert extinct animal name here].

I ended up getting the offer to come to Joplin and that's when things really started to change (then again, we are talking about a six-year stint of time).

Stay tuned for Part II: The Joplin Years and into the future...