Trimming The Tree

I've been looking at the family tree information I've been collecting over the years. This has mostly been gathered from looking at birth, death and marriage certificates either locally or at Register House in Edinburgh.

I'm looking at it specifically to pass some of the information on to an uncle who I'll see at a family get-together on Saturday night. My problem is that there is so much of it and it's badly organized.

So I've trimmed it back a little - concentrating on the main family lines and not including (at the moment) the extra data concerning brothers and sisters of the main forebears.

As I look over the names I wonder again at who these people were, not in terms of occupation or where they lived, but how they were to talk to, were they friendly, polite, cantankerous, bad-tempered, funny? I know at least some of them will have the same family traits I see in my own siblings and cousins, but would I recognize that family resemblance if I went back in time and I saw them in the street?

None of my forebears were wealthy so family portraits and heirlooms are scarce prior to the twentieth century. I guess I'll never know but I can't help wondering who of all of them I take after.