[quote=@Regitnui]
[@AngelofOctober], you asked what broad strokes were, and there they are. I didn't include Rosai's failure to learn how to swim, the time she pinned a boy from another tribe in a fair fight and thereby discovered why her mother told her boys couldn't control themselves, or how she drank cactus juice, tied two sticks to her head and ended up declaring herself Queen of the Jackalopes

It's good you have all of that. It's plenty of ammunition for the plot.
[/quote]

-Learning to make necklaces is the answer to How he survived without help at first, that's actually a board stroke

-Going to Earth Bending school is the answer to How he continued his training, that's actually a broad stroke

When writing any history or IC post, you have to answer the common questions they give you in language arts, who, what, why, when, where, and how. 

I wrote my history to go into depth of all of those questions so no one was scratching their head going, what, how. How did he survive? By selling necklaces and taking odd jobs. Why did he do this? Because he use to work in his mother's shop.

Good writing isn't about Telling the Audience what is up. It's about Showing the Audience. And the Audience being able to infer from the clues in the writing and put the dots together themselves.