Pseudo-element ambiguities

<q cite="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/selector.html#first-line-pseudo">
The :first-line pseudo-element applies special styles to the first
formatted line of a paragraph. 
</q>

What does this mean? Does it mean that it spans the content of the line
box? If so, then in <p><span style="float: left; width: 1em">T</span>he
float, 'T' isn't matched by :first-line (see Bugzilla bug 13610, which
might not be valid as a result), since 'T' is simply aligned with the
line box, but does not form part of it.

If it matches something more than the content of the line box, it seems
that it should match '1' in:

1   This is a list item. 

, but that doesn't seem right either.

Some clarification of what is matched would be useful.

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