Greetings from HANDSOMEGUY51313

      Actually, the term is wrong. You're not chatting on the Internet. You're actually just typing on a computer keyboard. Admittedly you're responding to what other people are typing on their keyboards and they to you, but it in no way should be considered chatting. But that's what it's called.
      Perhaps you are new to Internet chat. If so, I will now share with you from my ... ahem ... limitless fountain of wisdom.
      First, you can't see the faces of the other people you're chatting with and thus can't read facial expressions. So the Net world invented emoticons to depict emotions. In their simplest forms, emoticons are punctuation like the following.
      :-) This is a smiley face. (Yes, it is. Just turn your monitor sideways. WHOA! Made my head spin. NOW TURN IT RIGHTSIDE AGAIN.) People use it after comments to show they're really just kidding as in, I completely disagree with everything you say, and you stink like rancid skunk armpits. :-) And then everyone knows you were just kidding, except for the person you sent it to, and he/she will respond with something like, I respect your right to your position even though it's obvious you have less brains than a squished slug. :-) Such discussions would end in gunfire if the people were in the same Real World room.
      ;-) This is a winking smiley. It's used for cute and subtle flirting, such as Are you a single female in her 30's with a hot body that would like to meet a nice, handsome man? ;-) If the female is smart, she will respond, Yes, but I'm chatting with some computer geek instead.:-) And laughs will be had all around, except by the guy, of course, who vows to track her down and stalk her for the rest of her life, but that's just me. I don't know how other men react.
      :-( Sad smiley. Used often by men just rebuffed by smart females.
      :-)> Smiley with beard. Used mostly by men and some carnival women.
      :-)} Smiley with double chin. Not used by anyone since we are all slim, attractive people in the chat world.
      (:-) Bald smiley. Used rarely.
      Smileys number in the thousands, but most of us don't have that many emotions even in the Real World.
      Smileys are not the only means to approximate Real World (or Real Life or Mundane Life or Normal World). Net chatters also use abbreviations, such as:
      LOL which means Laughing Out Loud. This is used a lot. For example:
      USER16: Hi, everyone. LOL
      USER24: Hi. LOL
      USER22: Hello. LOL.
      USER77: Greetings. ROFL
      Now 77 has taken it up a notch by Rolling On the Floor Laughing. Not to be outdone, USER65 dispenses with any type of greeting and types: ROFLH. (Rolling On the Floor Laughing Hysterically)
      77 immediately responds with: LSHICB. (Laughing So Hard that I Can’t Breathe)
      65 can't take this lying down so he shoots back with: LSHIMDFBL (Laughing So Hard I Might Die From a Busted Lung)
      Things could get ugly, but then luckily USER 14 enters the chat room.
      USER14: Hi, folks. LOL
      And the whole thing starts again. If they laughed that much at nothing in Real Life, they'd be put away and for good reason.
      Of course, no one uses USER14 as their screen name (or alias or avatar or chat handle). Instead they have names like BEAUTYGIRL or SURFERMAN or SWEETHING. I have yet to see HAIRYBACKMAN or ACNEGIRL. You will see many BRITTANYSPEARs and BRADPITTs. Of course, since those screen names are popular, what you actually see is BRITTANY304 and BRADPITT212. I've actually been in a chat room where three different people claimed to be Brittany Spears.
      And perhaps one of them was her. There's no way to know. You can claim to be anyone. And frequently people do. As a result, when a famous person enters a chat room, he or she is never believed when they say who they are.
      All this leads me to conclude that, despite all that chatting, not much communication is taking place in the Net world. LOL