Hi Mumsnet, I have been a member for a while here now, and I have read the the rules on several occasions, particularly if I have broken one or more of them.
You have very recently removed a post about the OP staying with friends at another of their friends houses, where the hosting was diabolical.
I was one of the posters who doubted that the OP was actually telling a true story. But I did eventually concede that she might have been, and apologised if I was wrong about her making the story up.
However, at no time was I concerned or worried about her making the story up - if she had, and I also never considered her to be a troll, as I thought a troll did things for malicious intent, and I never thought the OP was being malicious. I just thought that she was probably posting the story for her own entertainment and possibly ours too?
My first reply to her OP could, I agree, be taken as me saying her story was not done well enough, that she needed to make it more believable - that was when I referenced Coronation Street - so she could have taken that badly. At the time I posted that reply I thought the whole thing was funny - both her "story" (whether it was true or made-up) and also how Coronation Street seems to view their viewers. I am still sorry if my suggestion that she is not a good fiction teller upset her, it really was meant lightheartedly.
So Mumsnet, can you clarify for me that if I think a story is made up I must tell you, and that if anyone starts a thread, or posts on it something that isn't true, that makes them a troll, no matter what the intent was? I am not trying to be clever here - just as well I hear you say, as I am not quite managing it - I do genuinely want to know the answer, so that in the future I will hopefully not make any more faux pas - I am not including the 1 or 2 occassions that I have absolutely, and horribly broken the rules in the past, as faux pas; it/they were horrendous and I was lucky not to be banned for the first one. I have tried very hard since that time to not react emotionally to a post, and in fact not to read posts that I know are going to be triggering to me.
This will probably sound flippant again, but in my reply to a different poster in the post you just took down, I tried to give a humorous reply to her humorous post. I don't know if you can be bothered to look up that post of mine (I quoted her post about a toothbrush on a piece of string etc) - I don't blame you if you can't, we give you enough headaches as it is - but would either or both of us be considered trolls because we were (at least I thought so) obviously lying joking?
I hope that you can understand my quandary here, if somethings are ok to not be drawn to your attention, because they are obviously jokes, must otherthings be drawn to your attention, even if I or another reader of the post does not believe it to be either malicious or true?
Sorry, if I am being really awkward or obtuse, I am really not trying to be, I just want to know for future occasions, and it may be possible (though not probable) that other readers and posters would like to understand this better - which is why I didn't message you privately. Thanks if you have waded through all of this...