Playing Internet Poker Again

I am primarily a low limit player, because I hate to lose and I hate to feel like I am leaving it up to chance. I like poker because very few people recognize the skill involved. In low limit game you can still gamble, but you can avoid the huge risks and allow your skill to beat the other players.

In 2003 an article online about poker caught my eye, and I began researching more about poker and what it took to play online.

A short while later I used an online service to help me write an e-check, and I made my first $50 deposit. At first I didn't play for much, nickels and quarters mostly. Looking back, I wasn't very good, and neither were the other players.

I the beginning I won $100 or so and I promptly lost all of that and most of my first $50 too. I also bought my first poker book. Winning Low Limit Hold Em by Lee Jones

After reading the book, I got a better understanding of Texas Hold Em, and I also learned about what it takes to win at poker online. At the point I had $8 left in my poker account, but I went to the very low limits and I started winning again.

After that I was hooked, I joined poker forums and learned about other sites I could play at. I was riding the wave of the poker boom. I jumped from site to site, setting up new accounts and earning bonus money. Later I would withdraw that money and create a new account somewhere else for another bonus or I would redeposit at a site I had already been to because they were offering a redeposit bonus.

At the height of the poker boom you could be an average player, and as long as you didn't lose too much, you were making money from the bonuses. I would guess more then half of my profit was bonus money. It was free and everywhere!

In early 2006, I lost the time to play and I lost interest in poker. At that time, my poker career went from 10-20+ hours a week to maybe 2-3 hours a month.

Later that year Congress passed a law that did not ban online poker, but it caused some of the larger sites to no longer accept US customers. Also the largest payment processor ran into legal trouble and suddenly froze all US players’ funds.

Now here we are almost 2 years later. The smoke has cleared from the legislation and there are still a number of poker sites still allowing US players to play for real money. The major difference is how you can deposit and withdraw money, but that didn't take too long to figure out.

My next article will help you figure out how to make your first deposit.