The problem with all these is they don't address if the lines of text are long and much wider that the div overflow:auto does not ad a scroll bar that works right. Here is the perfect solution I found:
Create two divs. An inner div that is wide enough to handle the widest line of text and then a smaller outer one which acts at the holder for the inner div:
<div style="border:2px inset #AAA;cursor:text;height:120px;overflow:auto;width:500px;">
<div style="width:800px;">
now really long text like this can be put in the text area and it will really <br/>
look and act more like a real text area bla bla bla <br/>
</div>
</div>