Getting the textarea value with javascript

Hi,

I'm using FCKeditor with PHP:

<?
include 'fckeditor/fckeditor.php';

$initial_text = "Some text";

$oFCKeditor = new FCKeditor('text') ;
$oFCKeditor->BasePath = '/fckeditor/' ;
$oFCKeditor->Value = $initial_text;
$oFCKeditor->Create() ;
?>

it works like a charm but when I edit the initial text and try to get the new/modified text with javascript before submiting the form via:

var new_text_input = document.getElementById('text');
var new_text = new_text_input.value;

I always get the initial text no matter what changes I did. How can I get the new/modified text from the input?

Thanks,
JT