my, that is a difficult distinction. 
Yes indeed, it took me months to understand it. 
I just joined, and naturally, I’m full of questions 
I was initally interested because when I was about 15, I kept a dream journal and drew little pictures of what I saw - just for fun. Well, one night I was dreaming of my living room, and I thought to myself, ‘hey, I can’t be in my living room, because I am in my bed sleeping.’ I walked out on to the porch and put my foot on a step outside. Everything was so real, I just couldn’t be sure. My foot did not feel the cold cement of the steps, and I knew I was dreaming. This only lasted mere seconds, however, as I walked up the street barefoot, in awe and wonder of how cool it was. Then I lost control of the dream. I wasn’t trying of course, nor did I know any methods about actual lucid dreaming, and that this was actually happening to me.
I started by making another dream journal, about a week ago. After coming to this site, I went to bed, and repeated to myself, ‘when I wake up, I’m gonna remember what I dreamed’ over and over until I fell asleep. I could rarely remember more than one dream a week, so I didn’t know what kind of progress, if any, I would make. I was amazed. In the past week, I have been able to write down something I remembered every night. I am totally surprised at what a little concentration and motivation could produce. I didn’t know you could train yourself to remember dreams.
So lastnight, I had taken some notes in my journal and I was going over them. Yesterday I had spent all day walking around looking at things, at my dog, my boyfriend, the celing fan, saying ‘am I dreaming?’ Trying to get into the habit of doing RT in my waking life. As I went to bed, I was repeating my usual so I would remember my dream, but I was also thinking ‘am I dreaming?’ without trying because I had said it so much yesterday, I couldn’t help it. And then I thought that if I were to have a lucid dream, I wanted my setting to be a forest, nice and safe and private, where I could get the hang of it. Well sure enough, I went to bed and dreamt that I was in a forest. I was wandering around and I came upon my dog, and then something weird happened. All these calculations started to appear out of thin air, showing me the proportions of his nose to his face. As I looked at the dog little letters and numbers appeared all around his head and then a voice told me ‘therefore, you must be dreaming.’ It was strange, but I could not control it. It felt more like a movie of me reaching lucidity, rather than me actually doing it. It was a dream that I had no control over, yet I was still aware it was a dream. The big question is…was this a LD? Was this just a dream about me getting close to having one? It was not the experience I had when I was 15, which I thought was the coolest thing that’s ever happened in my life, but what then, was it?
that is the key … you were aware it was a dream while dreaming, so it was a LD.
The level of control in LDs does vary from dream to dream.
you are making very much progress in short time and yes, i think you can call that an LD… as long as you are aware that it is a dream its an LD… learning to controll them is another thing i guess… ive been on LD4ALL for quite a while now and i still practise my dream recall 
dont have much time to put my thoughts on LD’ing either though… well anyway, welcome to LD4ALL 
well thanks you guys I really appreciate the input. I’m new and so it helps to get the opinions of the veterans
I had a dream this morning that lasted about 5 minutes. I was in a University dorm that I had visited a couple of weeks ago. A couple other guys I know were there. I did a nose reality check, and found I was lucid. I also kept looking at my hands, and they kept changing postition and shape. However, the reason that I am doubting my lucidity is because I just realised I was dreaming out of the blue. I was walking up the stairs to the fifth floor when I suddenly realised that I was dreaming, and the reality check confirmed it. I think a possible reason for this is because I was awake for about 5 minutes before going back to bed for this dream, and I did this at my usual time for waking up. I continued doing reality checks the whole time I was dreaming, and was always positive for lucidity. I was also aware the entire time that my physical body would wake up if I moved it, which I had the power to. I think this means I was lucid. However, I’m not sure if I was simply dreaming that I was dreaming lucidly, because when I tried to fly (well, hover, because I would have hit a wall), it didn’t work.
So, the grand question is, was I lucid?
I think you were lucid Irrelevant,
You did realise you were dreaming, so it’s a lucid dream.
You’re not the only one who failed to fly the first time you did it. You could check this topic, to see some tips to fly
Good luck 
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