A bit more in-depth about rhythms and phrasing, thanks to Varien

Thanks for the mention, man! When I saw this post I thought I'd contribute, but looks like a lot of people covered it.

The main thing to drive home is that a good melody is not just melodic, but also rhythmic - work with simple 3-4 note phrases, as Wontolla said, and then build the rest of the melody off of that phrase.