Originally Posted by: Zac24

I tried to play melody (5 miles out) without looking at my hands but I regularly press the wrong fret or pluck the wrong string. I tried to play while looking at my hands, but I still mess the fretting and plucking up.

I've been playing since 1982 and I still look at my hands pretty often. Most guitarists do. My wife says the same thing as she is just starting out as well.

I'm like; 'why do you care if you look at your hands?'. You shouldn't care. Time will take care of when you do and don't look. Blindfolded knife throwers don't learn blindfolded first. That would be crazy. Same with guitar (but safer!).

So absolutely don't spend a second worrying about not looking. It's not important to your learning.

I do realize that you also tried to play it while looking to. There, the answer is really just to take your time. Break it down in to sections. Build up from smaller sections to the whole melody. It also doesn't hurt to hum the melody while playing each note slowly.

Humming a melody while you play is a great habit to learn too. It helps your ear and makes learning less mechanical. Less about your fingers not cooperating, Though as an early learner, those fingers don't exactly want to follow orders!