Simple question, or is it...

It sounds like when the signal is broken down into it's constituent parts and analyzed separately is when all the head scratching occurs.

You have fields which, by their very definition, don't move. You have waves that are the result of something moving, or you wouldn't have the wave. That something is moving much faster than the wave (or it wouldn't be a wave, unless it's a poor analogy).

Then you have the conveyance (the wire) to ponder. The field is generated around the conveyance and the wave is residing in that field and both act on the wire and different metallurgy reacts differently to them.

Inside that conveyance resides even more constituent components. Electrons that move so slowly that they can be eliminated as the signal carrier, but can have a contribution. A form of current (power) that's part of the signal (something has to propel it). The physical make up of the covering of the wire (dielectric) which imparts it's own negative contributions due to it's interference. 

With all of that in mind, I'll just trust my ears and leave pondering the imponderables to others. 😄

All the best,
Nonoise

I would like to add, that it is as far as I can understand it and, of course, I can be wrong (I was wrong once in 1964) :)

If it were you behind these hairdos, I don't know if I can ever forgive you:
https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2014/05/1964-the-world-50-years-ago/100743/

All the best,
Nonoise

Electric current in the cable is a flow of electric charge. Exactly the same amount of electric charge that leaves the source comes back to it. Energy is delivered from source to load by electromagnetic field in between wires. It is called Poynting field and direction of this electromagnetic wave can be determined by Poynting vector. Presence of the load creates voltage drop - an electric field between wires. Current in the wire creates circular magnetic field around it. These electric and magnetic fields are perpendicular. If you imagine them as X-Y axis then Poynting vector will be perpendicular to them as "Z" axis. This vector points always in the same direction, (from source to load) even with ac current, since both electric and magnetic fields change direction at the same time. In the coax cable, that was mentioned, whole energy (electromagnetic field) flows inside thru dielectric between wire and the shield.

This was one of the few times that when I read it, it made perfect sense, and then it just evaporated into the ether. I swear I almost visualized it. Thanks for that fleeting moment of clarity.

All the best,
Nonoise

Mass? I haven't been to mass in decades.