Slash Fan Fiction: Yaoi or Not?

I’ve been wondering lately how I should classify my reading of all the slash fic that I troll for. I mean, technically I only go looking for stories between two male characters, and I always select the mature content ones when they are there… however, I am hesitant to call it yaoi or BL. I wouldn’t be unheard of it to call it as such, since the genre started within the doujinshi community, and crossovers or dream pairings within said market are considered part of the genre.

I wonder if it has to do with the difference between having been drawn or only written down. If it isn’t drawn, it isn’t manga, and if it isn’t manga, does it still count as Yaoi? There is a whole genre of BL and yaoi novels and light novels in Japan, a few of which have been translated into English (and probably many other languages). Are those titles given some kind of status because they have been published in magazines, books and anthologies?

I’ve been trying to write a xxxHolic fanfic for the longest time, and still can’t get my head around it. I used to be full of short fiction goodness in my head, but when writing characters that already exist and have a following, in addition to fitting it into world created by someone else, I find myself at a standstill. My point here? Fan fiction is hard to write. It should be given, not necessarily equal footing as published works, its dues.

So, now that that’s been said, does that make it yaoi? Does the quality and or medium quantify a story as BL or yaoi? I’m at a loss!

Help me out, guys… Am I being biased against slash/fan fiction? Or am I right to consider it different?