To blog or not to blog? (and related questions)

I've wanted to start a blog for some time now, but I haven't because I couldn't figure out what I wanted to write about. Who did I want my audience to be? Would it be a completely private blog? Would I advertise it to my friends? Or wait for it to be discovered on its own. What about a name for the blog? Would it be anonymous? Or something like "Melissa's Musings" (Or is that even my real name? I guess you would know since I did choose to go with something anonymous. Or would you?)?

And what about a topic? A theme? A motif? At first I was pretty convinced that I wanted to write about something. Having a direction might help me come up with entries. Sometimes limiting the options makes it easier to make a decision ... but it makes deciding on that topic to begin with that much more difficult! Whatever I choose I have to be confident that I'll have enough interesting things to say about it. And that's a pretty bold assumption, isn't it? Am I claiming to be an expert? Heaven forbid!

So then I must consider why I wanted to start writing in the first place. I'm sure part of me wants to be recognized, maybe one day be discovered, asked to compile my entries into a book that's later made into a movie ... or not. Sometimes I do just want to write. Admittedly I don't take the opportunity all that often. My work rarely requires it, and keeping personal journals quickly devolves into whining and ranting. I thought maybe having an audience would keep things a little more ... artistic ... no, tasteful.

Even now, I haven't decided what to write! And yet somehow I've written an entry? What a paradoxical beginning.