What is the story behind your character's name?

[Mhaeric]

Mhaeric Llystrom as a name began back in 1993... 94? Something like that anyway.

I loaded up Dungeon Hack for the first time and created a neutral evil wizard with the red hooded picture as my avatar. I needed a name, and my usual one at the time wouldn't work for the character, so I came up with Mharic (without the e). I can't remember if it was randomly generated or made up on my own or a combination of both.

I go on to use this as my name for most games since I like it, including a MUD that I played off and on, mostly on, from 1997 to 2017. In 2000 I was creating a new character after returning from a break and wanted to use Mharic as a name for my Bard, but I didn't want to delete the original character. So I added the e, and the name became Mhaeric. This new spelling instantly became my more preferred spelling. The MUD had the option to choose a last name during gameplay, so I needed something elven sounding because I was an Elf. I remember going to various name generators and came across one that output some double L's which i liked the sound of. I imagine them rolling off the tongue and sounding like it would fit easily into what Tolkien elvish sounds like. and so I came up with Llystrom. Ever since then, my name is always Mhaeric Llystrom wherever I go.

It's strange to think that I've been using the same name, not counting variations, for over 23 years now.

(It was only years later that I realized the first name is an anagram of Chimera, and the last name is very close to Maelstorm and ends in a homonym of strum which is appropriate for a bard, which in that MUD uses elemental magic to create elemental maelstorms. Total coincidence, but nonetheless a serendipitous one.)