Just a quick cheat sheet on converting to/from string to byte[] and back. I never remember exactly the syntax, so always spend a few minutes looking it up.

//Convert string to byte
byte[] bytes = System.Text.Encoding.Default.GetBytes("The string"); 

//Convert to Base64, view/save in config files, etc
string base64 = Convert.ToBase64String( bytes );

//Convert from Base64, back to string
bytes = Convert.FromBase64String( base64 );

//Convert byte to string
string msg = System.Text.Encoding.Default.GetString(bytes); 

//Create memory stream based on byte array
MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(bytes);
StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(ms); 

keywords: string byte convert base64 hex