You wanted to know who wins the money in poker, and why it isn't you - at least in any large quantities ($17 just isn't much of a win after putting in four hours of play).

I have an answer to your question, but it will take a few minutes, so relax awhile - and give me your mushrooms. There is a rather mysterious segment of poker players among us who are known collectively as consistent high-stakes winners.

While there is nothing secretive about this group, membership doesn't appear to be open to everyone. We see their pictures and read their names regularly here in Card Player. You can even watch them play in the public cardrooms and during major poker tournaments. But, generally, you can't chat with them and you can't pal around with them - unless you become one of them.

For the most part, they are nice enough folks who tend to hang out with their own kind, just as you and I tend to pal around with our own level of winners. But these highly visible, somewhat removed, and mysterious players are said to have first call on the world's available supply of poker luck. The truth, as usual, is far less mysterious.

Simply put, they are more skillful, and there is no mystery about poker skill. Anyone with a reasonable amount of intelligence - and the desire - can acquire poker skill. As a matter of fact, it's quite easy. And therein lies your ticket for entry into our aforementioned elite group.

You'll actually be able to talk to these players, and they will answer you. You could pal around with them. You could be one of them. And less-skilled players will admire you - from a distance, of course.

Well, if it's so easy, why don't more players do it? I'm not really sure. I suspect it's because they don't realize just how easy it is. More likely, they are not willing to put out the effort required. And even more likely, most people who play poker aren't really poker players - they are gamblers. Poker just happens to be the form of gambling they have chosen. It's the gambling that interests them, more than the poker. In poker, their money lasts longer than it does out in the pit. How else can we account for so many players playing so badly so consistently?

Between these poker gamblers and the gamblers in the pit who are playing craps and roulette, there is little difference. Pit players are gambling, pure and simple. There is no strategy they can use to overcome the house percentage over a period of time.

However, there are strategies available to the poker player - strategies that can carry him into the world of the poker elite - if he chooses to learn and use them. Most players do not choose to use them. They play on hope - hoping for good cards and good luck. They are gambling, pure and simple.

Many players do put some thought into their games, using various strategies for various situations. This is called skill. So, among the first things you want to determine when sitting down to a poker game is, who are the gamblers and who are the poker players? Then, play each accordingly. How can you tell which is which? And how can you tell which you are?

If you have any difficulty determining who's a poker player, it's because you are a gambler. A poker player will easily recognize the other poker players at his table, because he is a poker player. "It takes one to know one."

So, back to your question. You've probably heard the cliché, "Money goes to money." Generally, a cliché becomes a cliché because it's true. Otherwise, it wouldn't have lasted long enough to qualify. But when we apply this cliché to the game of poker - well, "It ain't necessarily so." At the poker table, money doesn't automatically go to money. It goes to those with skill.

Go forth and become skillful.

Thanks for the mushrooms. Now it's my naptime. Kill the light on your way out.

Editor's note: Roy West, author of the bestseller 7 Card Stud, the Complete Course in Winning, available from Card Player, has a toll-free number and continues to give his successful poker lessons in Las Vegas to both tourists and locals. Ladies are welcome. See his ad on Page 86.