pidgin keeps revealing my real name.

[Kate]

I'm trying to learn how to participate in an IRC chat room for a forum I
help moderate. I need to use my alias to do this... but Pidgin seems to be
pulling my real first name from somewhere in my computer or modem
settings... apparently it displays something along the lines of
"jane@[whatever.number]
has joined". I suppose maybe that's my IP address? Is there a way to disable
or mask this?

I'm using Vista and Firefox, if that helps. I know embarrassingly little
about any of this, and any help will be appreciated.

Thank you.
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