TextArea in a Web Service

I added a TextArea to my aspx form to store user input. However, when I use

strComment = txtComment.text

I get an error saying 'text' is not a member of 'System.Web.UI.HtmlControls.HtmlTextArea'.
This is because TextArea is an HTML control. So how do I use a TextArea and store user input as a string?? I cannot get away with using a textbox in this situation.

Much Appreciated.txtComment.Value gets the string.