I’m not going to lie. When I got my DNA results back from Ancestry this week I was confused.

14, –, 11, 14, 12, 13, 28, 24, 10, 13, 13. . . .

A lottery ticket? I wanted to know if I was related to Princess Di. And what about the diseases I am prone to develop in another twenty years?

The Ancestry DNA test won’t provide you a pedigree chart of pop stars or a medical forecast. But once you understand what those numbers stand for, you may be even more excited.

THE Y-DNA 33 MARKER TEST
I recommend you start with the Y-DNA 33 marker test, which tracks your paternal lineage.

There is a mitochondrial DNA test for checking your maternal lineage, but unfortunately it is more effective at telling you who you are not related to than who you are related to. I hate to privilege the paternal side of my family tree, but for now the Y-DNA test seems like it gives the most bang for its buck.

Women, you can’t take a Y-DNA test, but don’t worry—you can still track your paternal lineage. All you have to do is get your dad, your brother, or a male cousin to take the test for you.

DADDY’S LITTLE GIRL
Convincing my dad to take the DNA test proved harder than I thought. To be honest, my dad’s such a cheapskate I thought he’d jump at the chance to do anything for free. I mean, I was going to save him $150.00 (yes, the tests are a little pricey). And he’d get to take a DNA test without drawing blood. How fun is that?

But, turns out he’s tuned into a little of the identity theft discussion that’s become ubiquitous these days.

“Look,” he said, “It just seems like a breech of my privacy. I don’t want my DNA test results floating around on the Internet where anyone can see them.”

“Dad,” I whined, “The only people that can see your results are those who have also sent in their DNA and have access to the database. And, no one can see your phone number, your e-mail address, or anything else about you but your name. If it really bugs you, you can change your privacy settings once you get your results back and make your user name anonymous.

“Besides, I have to write an article on this for the newsletter. If you don’t do this I won’t have enough money to eat.”

He agreed to take the test.

THE RESULTS
So, as I mentioned, when I got my results back I had a series of numbers that looked more like a bingo card than a family history panacea.

What I quickly learned was that alone, my DNA tests meant very little. It was only when I compared my results with other people who had also taken the test that it took on some meaning. (Deeper life lesson? Maybe that everything in life is better when we do it with someone else.) Once I’d found members with similar results, I was supposed to contact them anonymously through the Ancestry Connection service so we could compare family trees.

Loretta M., Kathi G., and Calvin F. beware. You may be getting an e-mail from me soon. And, I hope you’ve done your homework. I’ll give $100 dollars to the person whose family tree gives me Margaret Jones’s maiden name.

IT’S A MATCH
In all honesty, I probably won’t be sending any of those individuals an e-mail anytime soon: the one most closely related to me probably only has a connection within twelve generations. That seems too broad to me to be of any real relevance right now.

But the exciting thing about this whole DNA testing process is that it continues to become more useful the more people take the test. In fact, between the time I first checked my results and now, about thirty new people with similar DNA results have been added to my results page. And, the first time I checked, my closest match was within fifteen generations—not twelve.

In a couple months, when I’ve forgotten I ever coerced my dad into taking a DNA test; when I’m right in the middle of writing a riveting article about the world’s largest online collection of Sicilian recipes, I expect to be distracted by an e-mail notification flashing up on my screen: Jana Lloyd, DNA Ancestry is pleased to inform you we’ve found another potential match. . . .

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Next month I’ll explain a little bit more about the science behind the DNA tests. In the meantime, to read more about the DNA tests available, or to actually purchase a DNA kit and be able to tell your iPhone-loving kids that you bought into a piece of cutting-edge technology before they did, go here.

Jana Lloyd is editor of the Ancestry Monthly newsletter. She can be reached at AMUeditor@ancestry.com but cannot assist with personal research questions.