OK, so why the verbal punctuation mark to start the Details section of a question?

<———You’re right. High school kids do it ~

Okay, so like I went back through and looked at my last few questions. I haven’t done it recently, but I’m sure I’m guilty of that. And I have to think to remember high school. Maybe it’s like the people that use um’s to cover blank spaces?

“Well, -” is an older version of this, I think. In speech, it seems to function as a way of centering the listener’s attention on you before actually delivering your content, kind of like clearing the throat before speaking to a group. It also gives the speaker an extra second or so to formulate his thought without leaving an awkward silence. In effect, it says “I’m about to address the matter you’ve raised, so get ready to hear me”.

The fact that this has bled out into written form is probably just a way of making one’s text sound conversational.

^^ Bang on the money

It is partly what @thorninmud described, but I think it is also used to keep the beginning of the statement from sounding too abrupt or too demanding.

Alright so… Is it a confidence or maturity thing? The hardest thing to do is to start. I have a feeling this has always happened to a degree but in the rereading and editing it gets dropped as a placeholder.

With the added informality and the more commonplace quick unedited messages are shot out into the ether people have lapsed into a state of laziness.

Um… well… gosh… errr… I wish I knew.