$re = '/\A(\/\/ --- Literal)[\r\n]+|(\/\/ --- Edited)\z|\/\/(.*[\r\n]*)/i';
$str = '// --- Literal
//
//At the same time as that, joining in the music
//will be fun, I think.
// --- Edited';
preg_match_all($re, $str, $matches, PREG_SET_ORDER, 0);
// Print the entire match result
var_dump($matches);
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php