The problem with using pen and paper for first drafts -

- is that sometimes you can't find the pages when you want to type them up.

I did find them, the next morning, hiding under a pile of magazines. I must have shuffled everything together when hurriedly tidying my front room one day. I've now found a bright red document wallet to keep my handwritten pages in.

I was doing quite well at getting the sequence of events down on paper, but I wasn't satisfied with my main character. She was coming across as very sharp tongued and vinegary. It was realistic that she'd be like that, with the background I've given her, but I was worried that readers would find her too unlikeable, before I'd had a chance to show her more sympathetic side. However, if I tried to tone her down, she became bland, lacking any personality at all.

I decided to let her develop however she wanted, and worry about whether she was likeable later. I've now seen how I can tweak a secondary character, who appears early in the story,  which will strengthen my main character's motivation in a way that I hope will make her more sympathetic from the start.

Now I just have to get it down on paper, or on the screen.