How do you play/succeed as a melee bard?

[Auchae]

A bard can barely go toe to toe with something solo. Kiting is a solo thing. Bards have an AC penalty iirc so they don't make the best tanks, but at low end they do alright considering they can hold aggro with certain songs and twist in other melee oriented songs to increase output, but a bard's dps doesn't match up with a monk, rogue, ranger, warrior because of lack of double attack and tanking ability doesn't measure up to SK, Pally, or warrior because of penalty and other defensive oriented things that factor in. In group situations, they are there to fill in for what you don't have, which is anything outside of a healer, althought their regen song really saves mana for the healer. Playing a bard up to around 20ish on P99 with lowbie twink gear (had hp rings, PGT, mino ribcage, etc.. cheap stuff) I could tank very easily and swap in instruments for song twists at right times for maximum song strength.. but it gets tiring. I'm sure a well equipped bard can tank well up to 40 or so.