It was one of those things that just seemed to fit.

Willie Stovall, in Albertville (Ala.) at the time, enjoyed repairing electronics.

His specialty was laptop computers.

The 66-year-old Stovall calls Southaven home these days. He can be contacted via his Web site, laptopwillie.com.

Catchy, huh?

"I have people that write to me through e-mail and ask me what could be wrong with their system," he said. "I give them advice as to what I think is wrong and sometimes they end up sending them to me.

"I recently added some advertising. I don't get a lot of money off the site. I think the ads I've had on there have generated $7.42 over the year, so you're not going to get rich off of it, but I'm able to help people and that's what I set it up for."

Stovall has seemingly enjoyed a high-tech career his entire life.

"I retired from the Air Force, and there's not a lot of call for long-range radar repair people in the civilian community," he said, "so what I had to do was to retrain in computers. Actually, IBM and Kodak had a program going where they were going to open up a laptop repair center in Memphis. Eventually, it was sold.

"I worked for them about four or five years, before we moved to Huntsville. I've got 15 to 20 years of experience with doing nothing but laptops. In fact, I'd just as soon stay away from desktops."

Peggy Stovall is impressed with her husband's expertise.

"According to his mother, when he was a little squirt, he would go around sticking things in light sockets and tearing apart toasters," she said, "so that's always been in his blood.

"It fits him and it fits him well."

As the months pass, Stovall, who also builds Web sites for people, has learned to be patient.

"It takes time to get your name out," he said. "One of the things I've done is put magnetic signs on the car.

"The thing that I pride myself in is I tell people what I think about their laptop problems. When they want to know what I think is the best (brand), I tell them it's like a car -- if you're going to use it to haul dirt, you don't want a 4-door sedan."

While Stovall has received testimonials from as far away as Baltimore, he's always looking for more Mid-South opportunities.

"Since I've been here, I have gotten a lot of hits on the Web site, but most of them are not local," he said. "They're out-of-town people I've done work for -- in Maine, down in Florida and Texas, out on the West Coast.

"This is a tool for them; it's not their life. They don't want to sit down and figure out, 'How do I start this program?' or 'How do I keep my stuff safe?' and they shouldn't have to. The interaction with people and trying to educate them towards what they've got is the big thing for me."

-- Chris Van Tuyl: (662) 996-1411