No more dusty document morgues in dilapidated City Halls. No more trekking through the overgrown brush of forgotten cemeteries. (No more room service at the Holiday Inn?)

Times have changed in the genealogy business. Now there is a good chance you can trace at least some -- if not most -- of your family tree without leaving the comfort of your home or office.

The Internet offers a wealth of resources for the amateur genealogist, and it is very good place for the beginner to start. Included among some of the key resources the Internet offers are: personal Web pages, family mailing lists, county mailing lists, county web pages, names of cemetery occupants, as well as marriage, death, and census information. Many of the resources are free to use.

Personal Web Pages If you're interested in seeing what the Internet has to offer, you might want to first get comfortable with some of its genealogy sites by performing the simple search for genealogy on your browser.

Take a look at some of the pages your browser has found. You will notice that there are many personal ancestry pages on the Web. Surf around and see the different ways in which various family trees are presented. Now get a little more specific. Search for genealogy and your last name (e.g., genealogy Smith). You should see some personal pages posted by people who share your name.

Mailing Lists A good way to connect with same-named people is to subscribe to a family mailing list. Subscription is free, and you can unsubscribe at any time. These mailing groups bring together people from all over the country who are researching the same name. When you subscribe, you will receive every e-mail query and every response that is posted to the group. This is a lot of e-mail, but you will get much information you will find helpful to your search (and much that you won't need).

The fun thing about a mailing list is that you will surely connect with a contemporary "cousin" or two that you didn't know you had! And it will give you an opportunity to share your family tree information with others.

There are also county mailing lists that are comprised of people who are doing research in a specific county. You will find an excellent mailing list group, hosted by RootsWeb, on the ROOTS-L Home Page.

One of the most ambitious genealogy resource on the Internet is the USGenWeb Project Nationwide, it is maintained by volunteers whose goal it is to provide free access of ancestry information for genealogists. From there, you can access state pages; and from there, county-specific pages.

Some pages are more informative than others. Take a look at the Chester County, Pennsylvania, USGenWeb site to see an excellent county page. USGenWeb is also a good source of maps, census data, and other information.

Copies or transcriptions of wills not only confirm residence and dates but will add some fascinating oral history to your findings, as will transcriptions of church records if you are fortunate enough to find some of those.

(The Quakers have some excellent historical information available on the Internet.) While many of these kinds of records are to be found in your Internet search, it is wise to request confirming copies of the documents by mail from the appropriate agencies. Many genealogical Web sites include County Courthouse addresses, etc., to assist you in doing this.

2. Don't expect the same name to be spelled the same way in all instances. Records such as deeds, marriage bonds, and census documents were, of course, handwritten in the past. Often the last name of an individual may be spelled differently from one census year to the next. Also, allow for typographical error by the transcriber.

3. Think county! Knowing the city or township and state of a birth or death is not enough. The county is the important piece of information when looking for records relating to your departed family members.

4. Start with the most recent relative on whom you have information and work backward in time. The best place to start is to talk to those still living -- your parents, your grandparents, elderly aunts and uncles. (Don't forget to check with your cousin who has Grandma's family Bible. Bible records are a great source of family history.)

You will also find these people will be a rich source of oral history (and old family pictures), that you might want to include in your finished project.

5. Expect your family and friends to think you're nuts! They will say, "They're all dead, so what does it matter now?" Don't even try to explain.

Probably the more you say the less they will understand, so just enjoy your journey and share your enthusiasm with your newly found genealogy family. Only when you have a "finished" product, complete with old family photos and some oral history, will your family members be able to share your excitement with you.

6. Prepare to get hooked! What you might begin as a hobby to fill some free time will turn into much more. And once you have your first experience of reading the actual Last Will and Testament of one of your forefathers, you will bid farewell to your other spare-time hobbies (and the dishes and the laundry and the yard work)!

Nothing will ever take the place of the feeling you get when standing at the moss-covered tombstone of your great-great-great-grandfather in an old forgotten family cemetery, or dipping your toe in the Creek in Virginia that bears your family name. If you're lucky you will someday be able to do these things. But until then, surfing up your family tree will carry you to other places and other times, give you a greater sense of identity, and may even turn into the greatest gift you could ever give your children.