This is going to sound like a dumb question (maybe really dumb) but it’s been destroying my brain for too long. I can’t exactly wrap my brain around where any given note on a cleff should go on the bass frets themselves.
So, for Em, E should be on the 7th fret of A right?
I think you’re asking yourself about this?
Then Em → The E-Minor scale can start on every “E” on the fretboard. (Not on the 6th fret of the A-string, that would be an Eb-Minor scale)
oh this question just made me realize why trying to play violin songs on bass is so difficult (lol):
Not only are the strings from lowest to highest opposite (as I thought before), the gap between the strings is bigger too 
.
On bass there are 2 steps between each string: E (F, G) A (B, C) D (E, F) G
On the violin it is 3 steps: G (A, B, C) D (E, F, G) A (B, C, D) E
Thanks @GeebGrables for inducing that lightbulb moment 
Yep. The bass is tuned in fourths; violins, cellos etc in fifths.
This is the first time I’ve seen this, but it makes a lot of sense to me. I’ve heard, for example, if the note is an E there are multiple Es on the fretboard and you can play whichever you want. But this never made sense to me, sheet music has multiple Es and they are different and not interchangeable, so surely there is a difference on the fretboard between the E a ledger like below, the E in the middle, and the E two ledger lines above.
@GeebGrables As Jules said. If you know the song, just play all the E-notes on the fretboard, starting with the open E, until you find the one that sounds the same as the E from the song. From there you can figure out where the other notes are played.
Any E can be minor, minor is the shape of the scale.
The quality of the stolen stock image is not the best, the graph shows which note position on the sheet music is played where on the fret board:
I’ve learned so much more in the 4 months playing bass (doing the course) as I did in taking violin lessons for about 5 years as a kid 
. I just didn’t care at all how the violin would fit in with other instruments in a composition, I just wanted my playing to be beautiful.
