What's the difference between a secret admirer and a stalker

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^^Yep.

A secret admirer is...well...secret.

A stalker is the opposite. Stalks you. So is anything but secret. Gets in your face in ways you're all too aware of.

There is a line.

An admirer has not crossed it, a stalker has.

^^Unfortunately, some people don't make such a line very clear, and you're left guessing.

I struggle with most of the nonverbal stuff, and the stuff you're just "supposed to know", as well as people saying one thing, but meaning something else. I take things very literally.

Recently, I made my first attempt to date someone not on the spectrum in nearly 15 years, and I worry that not understanding those things derailed that attempt.

A secret admirer will leave flowers on the doorstep,a stalker will be laying in wait on the doorstep.

It isn't that hard. You can teach yourself.

I have had to behave very carefully not to cross that line recently.

Well, the difference is quite clear...

A secret admirer really likes you, but hasn't told anyone that he does

A stalker hides in the bushes outside your house with a rag covered in chloroform

Notice the difference?

It's the taking things literally part that eats me up the most. How would I know if it's something I should take literally, or if I should expect a hidden meaning. Or is it a real crapshoot?

From my experience: A secret admirer is attractive, a stalker is not.

I've seen a number of people here give variations on this response, but I really do think there is an objective difference that's not just in the eye of the beholder, namely that a stalker is actively stalking, while the admirer is content with infatuation from afar. The hard part is drawing the line, no one is going to dispute that the guy physically following someone is a stalker, but when does, for example, due diligence research on an internet date turn into cyber stalking? Personally, I think it's somewhere between perusing someone's social media and running down their job, address, phone numbers and school history, but that's just my opinion.

Anyone with

a) a brain
or
b) fair

Doesn't think this.

I've had unattractive males like me but they certainly weren't stalkers. If you get this a lot, maybe you should stop liking air heads.

Its simply about what they focus about. Stalkers mainly care about owning something, they think to deserve, instead of actually caring for a certain person. So they are not interested about the person itself and his/her feelings, but simply about their own. If they get told, that there is no interest for engaging contact from the opposite, they dont care for it, because its only what the dumb thing, they want to own is thinking, and now what the only important thing, themselves is thinking. If the other one is telling them to be scared of a certain behavior, is not important to them, because according to them, their stalking-victim should think otherwise of it, and thats the only thing that is important. Just as societies have agreed that certain intensity of interest in another person lifes, that has yet not told you to be ok with you, is not acceptable. As following you around, trying to read your post or E-mails, or getting other private informations on you. Which the stalker will not care for, because of the stalker itself thinking otherwise about it, and that will be the only thing important.

Or shortly: An admirer is someone respecting you. An stalker is someone respecting only him/herself.