Tabs for the Guitar
When you are looking at a tab, you will see six horizontal lines. These lines represent the strings of the guitar. The bottom line is the 6th string (the thickest string on your guitar, low e) and the top line is the thinnest string (the first string, high e).
Arpeggio
An arpeggio is a type of broken chord in which the notes that compose a chord are individually sounded in a progressive rising or descending order. Arpeggios on keyboard instruments may be called rolled chords.
e|--------2-----------------|
B|------3---3---------------|
G|----2-------2-------------|
D|--0-----------------------|
A|--------------------------|
E|--------------------------|Metallica – Enter the Sandman (Intro)
e|---------------------|------------------|---------------|--------------------|
B|---------------------|------------------|---------------|--------------------|
G|---------------------|------------------|---------------|--------------------|
D|-------5-------------|----5-------------|----5----------|--------------------|
A|----7-----------7----|-7-----------7----|-7-----------7-|--------------------|
E|-0--------6--5-----0-|-------6--5-----0-|-------6--5----|--------------------|Pasted
The next note is marked as a 7 on the 5th string, so place a finger on the 5th string 7th fret. The third note is the 5th fret 4th string. By now you are probably realizing that in order to play this riff, you need to use your 3rd finger on the 7th fret and your first finger on the 5th fret.
You can then finish out the riff by grabbing the 6th fret on the 6th string with your second finger, then the 5th fret with your 1st finger, and finally the 7th fret 5th string (a string) with your 3rd finger.