I’m Toni and I’m 63 and on my 3rd (and hopefully successful) attempt to learn guitar. I bought a cheap & nasty thing as a Steve Harley loving teenager and Bert Weedon did NOT get me playing in a day or a year. I sold it and bought a horse
In the late 90s I bought another guitar, inspired by Jarvis Cocker and tried … and failed again.
Now I’m having another determined effort. I’m barely 5 foot so this time I bought a 3/4 size guitar. It’s a beautiful Tanglewood Winterleaf. I called him Ziggy. I went out to buy milk for work and came back very excited with Ziggy! With Justin’s help I’m already further on than ever before!
My guitar heroes are Pete Townshend, Johnny Marr, Dave Gilmour Richard Hawley, John Martyn and Bruce Springsteen. And Jarvis!
I’m struggling like mad with the D chord, but I will get there. Loving the journey so far and I adore Ziggy (my guitar), he plays a mean A chord!!!
Toni x
Welcome to you, Toni, nice to have you as part of the community, and so enthused about learning. Playing and learning guitar is a ton of fun, and you’ll find lots of encouragement and support here.
Welcome to the community 
Hello Toni and Ziggy ! 
What happened to the milk ? Good to see another restarter restarting and immediately making more progress than in previous attempts. You’re in the best place for learning in a structured manner and the wealth of experienced of folk here, should you ever get stuck.
Enjoy the ride.
Cheers
Toby
Welcome to the Community, Toni. You are on a good path now, and if you persist with Justin in a slow and steady way you’ll succeed.
Great to hear that Toni and Ziggy play a mean A chord (rather than wasting time playing mean pinball 
)
Luckily I got the milk before I got ‘diverted’ to the music shop. I asked my colleague to guess what I’d bought when I got back. His guess was apple pie!! Certainly surprised him but he said Ziggy looked perfect 
Love it!
What a cool story! That`s really funny. Hope you and Ziggy have a lot of fun together!
Welcome to the community @TangleJangle
All you need, including the help and support of others, is here.
Looking forward to hearing you play ziggy stardust with ziggy 
My guitar playing nephew said I should learn the riff, I’ve looked at it… 
One day, one day 
Good Luck, although you won’t need it, just patience and time will get you there.
I reckon i’m about 6 months in front of you, and trust me, very soon you’ll be wondering what the fuss with D was. i never thought my fingers would stretch to Dm and F, but with time and patience they do.
Welcome! Bert Weedon didn’t do it for me either! This is definitely the best place to learn, wish it was around 50 years ago!
Hey @TangleJangle
Love your story and I’m sure that 3rd time will be acharm for you.
Be patient with yourself and don’t flash back to these 2 previous attempt too much.
Every minute you put into it will benefit your chord forming and changing.
Try to practice 5 days a week, even if it’s only a few minutes! (I strongly believe that the rest and sleep in between is just as important as the “notes you don’t play” in between notes in a musical piece ;))
for everything else, WE are HERE!
Beautiful!
He should be done under the trades description act!
Update! Ziggy has played the D chord several times in a row now 
I’m so pleased with him after yesterday’s despondency 
That’s mighty fine progress for one day; keep it up 
HI, TONI. I got my first guitar in the mid 1950s. (at 14) and it took me ages to learn how to play it. My first mistake, in learning how to play, is I just bought a song book and tried to play. What you don’t know will drag you down and make learning very difficult. The first mistake is my not knowing every guitar needs to be “set up” for the person playing. All new guitars are terrible if they are NOT set up. The strings are always way too high off the fretboard. The guitar shop will lower them to fit your hands and fingers. I have two broken wrist which hamper my flexibility. I have short fingers and wide hands. (not the best of hands for guitar or pianos.) Once your guitar is set up for you, it will suddenly be far easier to play. A set up should not cost more than $50 unless there are repair adjustments needed on the guitar. There are tons of free lessons on YouTube.com. Some of them are really good. Lessons will quicken your learning experience. Play everyday at least 5 minutes. Play longer if you wish, but do pickup the guitar daily for at least 5 minutes. When learning something new, play extremely slow. When you can play that D chord with zero mistakes. Then play slightly quicker until you can play that speed without errors. I know. That sounds stupid. It is actually brilliant. “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” or “Mary Had A Little Lamb” is everyones first song to learn. When you can play and sing those songs, at any speed, learn something else you already know. (never stop again)
Thank you! Yes, I bought a rubbish guitar and some song books and a Bert Weedon book on attempt one and of course got nowhere. Repeated that mistake in the 90s, another guitar that didn’t suit me, more song books albeit different songs. Same progress - nil!
This time I bought the guitar from a music shop with a very nice man who set me up. And it’s much more suited to my small size being a 3/4 one. Add to that Justin’s lessons and not only am I making (slow) progress, but I’m absolutely loving it. I do indeed pick it up every day, I couldn’t not!
So, the impossible D chord is now ringing out at least 70% of the time. When I managed it the first time it was a huge boost because I knew it was possible for me! And I’ve silenced the little voice in my head that says you’ll never be able to play guitar. Because I AM playing!
Thank you for your words, everything helps me along the journey
Hi Toni, welcome to the community. Good the desire to learn to play guitar found his way back. All the basics is just practice. Justin’s lessons can help a lot to accelerate your progress and find more of those rewarding I did it moments sooner in your path.