Mahabharat - a prelude

I was in Texas visiting Shrinivas, Shamli and Soumil for Diwali and in the course of our talks, the topic of the Hindu epics came up and we got a bit nostalgic about the days when B. R. Chopra's Mahabharat literally stopped India in the 90's. I remember when streets used to go silent between 10-11am on Sundays. Everyone, literally EVERYONE, whether they had a television set or not, used to sit glued to the tube in their or their neighbors' living rooms. The greatness of the show was such that it transcended economic and religious barriers. We used to have a muslim hawker regularly share one corner of our living room watching Mahabharat. Everything was excused on the pretext that, "Mein Mahabharat dekh raha tha."
Its been a while since I saw any recasts of the show and I was mentioning that to Shrinivas. He told me that www.rajshri.com aired these (and many other) episodes on their broadband site. I was ecstatic! And so, I started watching these episodes as and when I found time. And as I was watching these, I thought, why not document this great story as I watch it. Someday I might want to know Arjuna's lineage. There is a lot to learn from the great Indian epics and for some reason these great epics (and for that matter, Hinduism) are not as well advertised as they should be. As I learn more and more about the different cultures I am exposed to, I realize that there is no greater way of life than Hinduism. Thats just me and I, in no way would like to spark a debate here.
This is my attempt to put out there a brief synopsis of the Mahabharat. This is going to be no easy task. I hope my patience stands by me as I write this HUGE epic. I will try to grab some pictures to put in as I go along.
A word of disclaimer though. I will be jotting down the story as it was aired on B. R. Chopra's Mahabharat. If I get curious about some itsy-bitsy details, I will try to look it up and add some clarifications. I do not claim that my interpretation is perfect or total.I have added my comments/thoughts to the ongoing story where I deemed I should voice my opinion. Any comments to correct / refine it would be greatly appreciated. This is for my pleasure and future reference only. Some day my grandchildren might appreciate it. :)
I also am not a professional writer, so please bear with my prosaic errors. Also, PLEASE do not hesitate to correct them. I do not know if this will be one HUGE post or if I need to segregate the story based on certain criteria. I guess I will learn as I go along.
Without further ado, let me begin the epic.
Om!