How I Got Into Playing Chess

It must have been 1996 when I was at primary school, there was a games club after school that me and my friend at the time went to and one of the games there was Chess. I had never played before, but my friend knew how to play it, so taught me the rules with the teacher's help I began to learn how pieces moved, and proceeded to lose a load of games, as my friend was naturally more experienced having only just learned the game. I did enjoy playing though and I did eventually improve, I never took it seriously though it was just a game for fun, and I actually got a wooden Chess & draughts set for Christmas in 1997, sadly I have no idea what happened to it, I presume it was put into the loft and disposed of or given away at some point by my parents - who have no recollection of even buying me it! Sadly it probably got used maybe once or twice, as no one either A) wanted to play or B) knew how and didn't want to learn. I did get another Chess set some years later a miniature metal one, but again same story - no one wanted or wanted to learn how to play. I still have this set. After a while we stopped going games club because either it stopped or we got bored, and I never really bothered with Chess again apart from the odd game on the computer. I have chess games on my Atari ST and Amiga computers which I played from time to time, and eventually on the Mac.

In 2023 after being addicted to Wordle for a while, I began looking for something else to pass the time on work breaks etc and I've no idea how but chess came back on my radar again, I think someone I watched on Youtube mentioned that they play it online on Chess.com; so I went there and set up an account. The ads bugged me after a while and the ability to only review one game, so I joined with a full Chess.com membership that same year and began playing only with the knowledge that I had gained in primary school all those years ago - so as you can imagine, I wasn't very good, and castling was an alien concept to me - I had never learned this, so naturally lost a bunch of games simply on the basis that I didn't castle! I did pick that up eventually though, and before long at all I was pretty much addicted, and have played Chess every day since - my current streak on Chess.com as I write this in May 2026 is over 700 days.

My Current Ratings

As I play every day if I put my rating here it would be outdated information almost immediately, so the best way to track my rating is to follow me on both Chess.com and Lichess - my username there is Plechaim so should be easy for you to remember. Feel free to send a challenge for a game some time!

My Chess Content

One of the first Youtube channels I watched apart from Gothamchess was Chess with Patrick who was doing videos on his journey to 2000 ELO, and he is still on that journey today. I then began watching other Chess YouTube channels such as Apex Chess, Neanderthalchess, Anna Cramling and Blunderman which inspired me to start making my own chess videos as I found watching people play Chess interesting and entertaining - even those who werent professional players, so gathered I could make some interesting content too. You can Subscribe to me on youtube to see my chess content - along with other content I post from time to time including footage on music and computing.