Hello all, my name is Bill, and I am new.  I felt the need to state the obvious–my humour is rather dry.  I came across this off of Youtube when I was looking for examples of the correct pronunciation of the “r” sound.  Before that however, I was doing my own research online for learning Japanese, and I opted to follow the grade school curriculum (starting with the alphabet).  I didn’t really like discovering that there are 3 separate “alphabets” to learn, but nevertheless, I began anyways with Hiragana, followed by Katakana.  At this point I have those two “alphabets” memorized.  Aside from that and a few words and phrases memorized, and a very basic understanding of grammar and structure, I am a long ways from where I want to be. 

So hopefully I learn something here, and maybe meet some new like-minded people. 

Kanpai!