How would I go about to insert a graphical smilie? That is, not just a : ) or : D etc., but the real image? I couldn't find anything on Google, except "it can't be done cause an textarea cant have elements within itself", but it's clearly possible since you can do it in this textarea, like so

Thanks

Webmaster Talk is programmed to recognize special characters and then replace them with images.

A TEXTAREA can only hold text. Any HTML put into one will be shown as text only. The textareas on WMT are actually being converted into editors by taking the TEXTAREA content and importing it into an IFRAME, then hiding the textarea and allowing the iframed content to simulate a textarea. This is done with lots of scripting that can't be covered in this thread. When you submit the form, the HTML in the body of the IFRAME is silently placed back onto the textarea so that it may be posted to the server. This is how most WYSIWYG editors online work.

Oh, I had no idea
I thought there was some clever way of actually adding an image to a textarea. Thanks for the info Abel!

You're welcome