I've tried online dating before, there are definitely a few "old hands" aka sharks on there who will take advantage of someone new to it. When I first was 'chatting' to a guy - who was very keen on keeping his identity secret - I accidentally emailed him from my 'real' address (not the alias), which has my name, which is unusual - next thing I knew he started dropping personal details about me into online conversations - where I lived, worked/had worked, been to uni etc - he had from my name cyber stalked me and god knows how he found out so much (I am pretty discreet about putting personal info. online due to having a nut job ex)… then he was messaging me whilst driving past my house at 3 am commenting ooh you are still up shall I pop in? (Had never met the guy before). Very scary.
Needless to say I wised up pretty fast about being careful with my personal info after that.
You were very sensible not to go OP, and well done for backing off.
I'm sure there are great guys out there…(god I hope so!!) .. but I do find that lots of sites are full of 40+ year olds looking for young women as they are busy having midlife crises. The best guys I have found were a bit younger then me! For me, it was a nice way to get out there and imagine having a relationship again… I was in a bad way, as a long term single parent I couldn't even begin to think about it! I have met a few really nice blokes who have become friends, because for one or other or both of us there wasn't that 'chemistry' you need for a relationship. So there are some nice guys, just try and keep wise to the liars/married/cheats/scammers/ones who just want a leg overs/weirdos. There are some fake photos on there too - I was due to meet one guy in a pub, walked round and round, thought he wasn't there - turned out he was but he looked nothing like his photo. If it was him in the pic (which I doubt) it was a least 15 years old. Do they not think we will notice the missing years? And come on guys, if you're 5 ft 5 don't pretend you're 5 ft 9 - we will notice!!
good luck in the future. For me, I gave up online dating and have instead joined some 'meet up' groups - getting out and about with groups of predominantly single people my age has been more fun, and I have met some nice guys that way. None yet relationship potential (I think I am just a proper fussy bugger maybe, hah) but you could try that alongside the online stuff; what I like about it is meeting other female friends too, widening your social circle - gotta be a good thing. Friends have single friends :)