[Peibyn]

Dave Platt, many thanks! I feel you've understood my situation and as a result of what you've advised, I immediately want to start experimenting!

I have Audacity 2.0.0 loaded on my computer. Once the vocal line is loaded into it could you tell me, please, what I can do to add high-quality (realistic) reverberation?

About ten years ago, when last preparing a recording that has been selling quite well ever since, I went to Audacity's "Effect" tab and tried using what was probably the most obvious Reverb choice that I found there, but the result was horrendous. So there and then I just abandoned the notion of adding Reverb after the event, deciding that recording in a more reverberative environment or using the Reverb function of an amplifier, as I had done years before, was probably the only way of producing a true reverb effect. Now from what you have written I see that there was probably an option that I missed, or a plug-in I could have added, as you've suggested. I don't think I ever experimented with adding plug-ins to Audacity. But now that I'm finishing with the writing and publishing of a book and I feel the need to return to song-writing, I'm feeling much more adventurous!

Again, many thanks!

There are numerous software "plug-ins" available for popular
digital-recording applications, which can apply various types of
reverb, flanging, phasing, vocoding, and almost any other effect you
can imagine.

Take a look at the (free) Audacity recording/mixing app. It supports
several different plug-in standards (LADSPA, LV2, Nyquist, VST) and
I'm sure there are plugins you'd find both usable and worthwhile.