What is Liverpool Gay Quarter Chat?
This is a chat room for Liverpool’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender community.  We are also straight-friendly and welcome people from anywhere.  The chat room is powered by xat chat.  To find out more about this company click here

Sign In/Out
To sign in or out of the chat, press the Sign In/Sign Out button.  You will not be able to see or send messages until you are signed in, or refresh the page.

How do I change my Name and Home Page?
Click your name at the top of the visitor list on the right and select a new name and add your website details.  Every time you sign in, you will always have the same nickname and details.

How do I change my Picture?
To change your display picture, click your nickname on the visitor list on the right and choose one of the default images shown by clicking on it. You can use any picture you like but it must be uploaded somewhere on the Internet to do this.  Paste the link/url of your chosen picture into the picture box.  You can upload your own images to photobucket for use on the chat.

How do I find other people to chat to?
If there’s no-one in the Liverpool Gay Quarter chat, click on the group chat tab and browse the groups.  This will give you access to more than 8 million chatters who use xat chat world wide.

Add your MSN and AIM contacts
You can invite your MSN and AIM contacts to the chat.
Click on the Friends tab, then click “Add MSN/AIM friends“.
You need to log in to your MSN or AOL account. When you are logged in your MSN and AIM friends will appear on your friends list. To private chat or invite them click on their name in the usual way.
To invite all your MSN/AIM friends click “Invite all MSN/AIM friends”.

Visitor List
The visitor list is on the right and is a list of people who are currently chatting in the room. Each name has a person symbol next to it and the colour indicates their status. Green is online, red is off-line, gold is chat room owner, silver is moderator, grey is ignored, brown is banned, and blue is a member (members have to be selected by LiverpoolGayQuarter.com or other chat room owners).  Members can paste hyperlinks into the chat, guests cannot.  When you type a message your name in the visitor list will glow green to indicate you are talking.  When others send messages you will be able to see their name glow as well.

How to add friends
You can add as many friends as you like.  Click on their nickname and press “add as friend“.  Every time they enter the chat, you can see if they are online by pressing the friends tab on your chat box.

Smilies
Smilies are pictures that can be added to messages to show your emotion.  You can add smiles by choosing one above the message entry.  You can find more by looking at the tabs on the far left of the page.  Select the tab with four little smilies on it, then click the one you like.  The code for that smilie will appear in your chat box, just click enter and the it will appear in the chat. 

Sound effects
You can add a sound effect to your messages.  Visit here and find a cool sound effect.  When you see a sound effect you like, copy the code and paste it into the chat with your messages.

Turn Sound On/Off
You can turn chat box sounds on and off by clicking on the speaker icon on the bottom right of the chat box. A disabled sign will appear on it. To turn sounds back on, click again. If you want to turn the sound down, hover your cursor over the speaker, then move the arrow up and down to lower or higher the sound.

Sending/Receiving a Private Message
To send a private message to another user, click on their name in either the chat or the visitor list.  Click on Private Message and a large padlock will appear on the left side of the your chat box. The next message you type will only be seen by that person.
If you have received a private message, you will see a message in the chat that has a gold padlock next to it.  Only you will see this message.  You may wish to respond to this message by sending them a private reply.

Starting/Responding to a Private Chat
A private chat is a conversation with only two people.  When someone has started a private chat with you, a tab will appear with the senders name above your text box.  It will flash to indicate a new message and the speech bubble will remain green to show that you have not read it yet. Click on the tab and you will be in a private chat with that person. While you are having a private chat with one person you may also see the main room and other private chats flashing and remaining green to indicate new or unread messages. You can switch between these and maintain conversations with several people at once if you want to. When you have finished with a private chat move over the tab and press the red x that appears to close it.

Ignore Someone
If someone is bothering you or you just don’t want to talk to them then you can Ignore them.  Click on that person on the visitors list and click Ignore.  They will appear as grey in the list and you wont be able to see any of their message and they wont be able to start private chats with you either.  The ignore is remembered, even if you use the chat box another time.  If you want to Un-Ignore them and see their messages again click on the person in the list and click Un-Ignore. Please note that the ignore feature only lasts 12 hours, so when the 12 hours is up, and you are still being harassed or want to ignore them simply Re-Ignore.  If you are a moderator, you will still see messages from ignored users in the main chat but you won't receive private chats or messages.

Been Auto-Signed Out?
If you haven’t typed a message for over 10 minutes then the chat box will automatically sign you out. To sign back in again press the Sign In button on the bottom right. 

How do I turn off automatically sign in?
If you don’t want to be automatically signed in to the chat box on web pages you visit then you can turn off automatically sign in. On your profile page and uncheck Sign In Automatically. You will have to click [Sign In] every time you visit a chat box to appear on the visitor list and to chat. To return to automatically singing in click the Sing In Automatically check box again.

Multiple names?
You can have up to five extra names, to switch back and forth from.  Click on your name at the top right of the pop up box you will see “new user“.  Clicking that will make a default name that you can change and switch back and forth from other names you have added.  So instead of having to manually change your name you can switch from the other names you have added. Note after doing this you can't delete extra names!

Registering
To register, click on your name on the visitor list and select “Register”.  Registering allows you to keep your ID, status (moderator, member, etc.), and friends list on other computers, or after your cookies have been deleted. This makes it impossible for other users to impersonate you, and makes it easier for your friends to tell who you are when you’re on other computers.  You can always logout and become just a number again.

How can I log out and become just a number?
Click here and then click “Logout”.

Will I keep the same status/friends list if I login to another computer?
Yes, your status and your friend list will be restored if you login to your registered account on another computer. You can login by clicking here 

How do I change my password?
Click on your name in the chat and click the "Register" button. Click the Change password tab.

I lost my password?
Click on your name in the chat and click the "Register" button. Click the Lost password tab.

Have you been Kicked?
If you have been kicked out of a chat box by a moderator then you will need to Sign In again if you wish to continue chatting. There will be an information message that is sent to everyone in the room they says who was kicked, who did the kicking and the reason for the kick. You will also be Unable to chat for 15 seconds after being kicked.

Have you been Banned?
If you have been banned from a chat box then you will have received a banned information message and your icon in the user list will be brown and the name will have been changed to "Banned". You will still be able to see the messages being sent but the other people in the room will not receive any message you try to send. The ban may be for a limited duration and if so you could return later. The ban may have been a warning and they may un-ban you sooner if you remain online for a while.
If you believe you have been unfairly banned you should click "Report Unfair ban" on the large window that appears upon being banned. This will send a message to LiverpoolGayQuarter.com saying that you've been banned, why you think it's unfair, and your email (If you included it).