I am happy that you decided to stop lurking and sign up. GA is all the richer for every new member who signs up, especially when, like yourself, they participate and get involved.
I know that I can speak for many authors when I say this, we appreciate every emoticon reaction left by our readers and we enjoy responding to and chatting with our readers via the chapter and story comments, they help to keep us going. The reviews left by readers and their story recommendations add more fuel to our enjoyment of writing and posting our stories and are very much encouraged, they also help to raise awareness of the stories we post and help to attract more readers.
Thank you for your comment about The Boot World stories, it really is appreciated. Your reactions and comments have been noticed, I hope you will be happy to know that there are more to come.
Authors receive a notification every time a reader leaves a reaction or comment to a chapter, chapter comment, story and story comment. We also receive a notification for each review that is left to our stories. When I have been bombarded by reaction notifications I've been very happy to receive them and always wonder what that reader thinks of the story, hoping they will leave a comment to let me know, this also allows me to thank them for their interest, reactions and comments. To be bombarded in this way by a reader is a delight, especially when it is to an older story.