OK. So you can write HTML. Great.
Great? Wait a minute. How do I go back and just write. No, dummy, not HTML. I mean like writing writing. Oh, I'm starting to cry.
Err, don't cry. Use pre.
What?
It's pre. You want to use pre.
<pre> All right, you lovely adorable yous, when you Really Want To just write, and not worry about where your words go, but just put them there... Then You Want pre. </pre>
It's that simple.
Since pre is nice and simple (as text generally ought to be), I prefer to keep the beginning and ending tags on separate lines.
That way I can see how it looks, while I'm typing.