I still remember the first day I decided to start learning the guitar. I asked permission to borrow my mother’s completely unused electric guitar, retreated to my upstairs bedroom, and began devouring the teach yourself guitar book that was stashed inside my mom’s guitar case. The book’s spine cracked when I first opened it, indicating how much effort my mom had put in to learning how to play, but I was determined to be more diligent. I had decided that I was going to become a musician, and the first step along that path was learning the four-note version of “Tom Dooley.”

In the process of learning the notes, I learned that I had basically no aptitude for reading musical notation. Fortunately, generations of previous guitarists had devised an ingenious method that allowed mere mortals to digest guitar music, called tablature, or “tab.”  Guitar tablature writes music as a combination of strings and fret positions, functioning as a play-by-numbers technique that makes the symbols of guitar music far less esoteric and abstract. Without tab, I’d have never lasted a day as a guitarist.

Even with tab, I almost didn’t last that entire first day. My mom had bought a decidedly cheap electric guitar, which isn’t bad in and of itself, but in this case it meant that the guitar had a painfully high action. “Action” is the term that refers to the height between the surface of the fretboard and the strings above it. A high action means that more force, and hence more pressure on tender ten-year-old fingertips, must be exerted in order to form the note. I tore my fingers to shreds in no time at all.

But I wouldn’t have changed it. Learning on a cheap electric guitar meant that I developed a keen appreciation for the quality instruments that I was later able to afford and enjoy, and added significant depth to my playing.