Scoring through the Internet, and looking for something interesting to write about, I came across this website that caters for - you guessed right, married men and women who like to embark on an affair. The site, aptly named "My Secret Affair" caught my attention and I decided to check what this was all about. So I enrolled as a member - not that I needed an affair, as I'm happily single - I just want to find out what kind of people would join such a site. The first thing I noticed while signing up was that they offer free membership for both men and women.

No sooner did I get into the member's area, I started getting 'virtual kisses' by male members online - virtual kisses are messages of interest sent out by members before they try and make contact. Some even sent me messages introducing themselves and wanting to chat. I checked out their profiles and was surprised to find some of them have also inserted photos of themselves. Most of the members I checked appear to be quite normal people you may otherwise not suspect if they sat next to you in the tube. Some even run successful businesses of their own, and say they're either looking to rekindle passion, or overcome stale partnerships by trying a different partner. Some of course, are there just to have some fun. The same with female members too - they all seem to be genuine and normal people. The site has all the features of any standard dating website, for messaging, chatting, sending kisses and adding people to your favourites etc. In addition, they also have an administrator online to help out other members online.

I got chatting to Katie, the administrator who was online at the time, she disclosed that she's online whenever she can, shuffling between her daily duties and her 2 year old son to answer any questions members may have, or to act on any complaints. She says all member profiles are carefully reviewed before they're allowed in to ensure they're as authentic as possible, and that the enrolling members know what they're getting into. Says Katie, "We go through each profile manually, so we can weed out brief, incomplete, and 'dodgy' profiles where men pretend to be women and vice-versa. We also make sure people don't use the website for selling their services - we want this site to be a safe and secure place, which enable members to express themselves in complete confidentiality. We discourage some members, normally men who try to join looking just for sex. This is not a sex-dating site, and we don't want this to become one."

Asked why they offer free membership while similar sites charge a small fortune for the same privilege, Katie admits, "We're offering free membership for a limited period to create interest and increase membership. Even when we do decide to start charging, it will be considerably less than what other sites charge for the same service. And we don't intend to start charging a fee at least for the next 3 months." I apologised for joining the site, wished her good luck and asked if I could check back again to see how it worked out - so, watch this space. This site is only for the residents of UK.

Their website can be visited at www.mysecretaffair.com.