9.7.1. The <textarea> Tag

As part of a form, the <textarea> tag creates a multiline text entry area in the user's browser display. In it, the user may type a nearly unlimited number of lines of text. Upon submission of the form, the browser collects all the lines of text, each separated by "%0D%0A" (carriage return/line feed), and sends them to the server as the value of this form element, using the name specified by the required name attribute.

<textarea> Function: Create a multiline text input area Attributes: ACCESSKEY ONKEYPRESS CLASS ONKEYUP COLS ONMOUSEDOWN DIR ONMOUSEMOVE DISABLED ONMOUSEOUT ID ONMOUSEOVER LANG ONMOUSEUP NAME ONSELECT ONBLUR READONLY ONCHANGE ROWS ONCLICK STYLE ONDBLCLICK TABINDEX ONFOCUS TITLE ONKEYDOWN WRAP End tag: </textarea>; never omitted Contains: plain_text Used in: form_content

You may include plain text inside the <textarea> tag and its end tag. That default text must be plain text -- no tags or other special elements. The contents may be modified by the user, and the browser uses that text as the default value if the user presses a reset button for the form. Hence, the text content is most often included for instructions and examples:

Tell us about yourself: 
<textarea name=address cols=40 rows=4>
  Your Name Here
  1234 My Street
  Anytown, State Zipcode
</textarea>