I notice the thread title first. If that's interesting (and grammatically correct!) I'll read it.
If the person who started it just started posting, and the topic is interesting to me, I'll reply. I definitely read a lot more posts than I reply to. Mils, HDS and Jo notwithstanding, I don't know how you'd find time to do this 🙂
Some people are just freaking hilarious when they write, but you might not know this until you got to know their sense of humor. I find it amusing when folks take that kind
of wit and/or sarcasm the wrong way - it speaks volumes to me about their own sense
of humor.
I will definitely notice sigs, too - some annoy, some are clever, some are hot, some have
fortunately been replaced with others 🙂
I do notice posts first from people I know, simply because they're familiar.
Lee