DB: mysql Ver 15.1 Distrib 10.3.37-MariaDB

I have a query that I'm struggling with. Hope I can find some answers here.

I have two tables

first_names (linenumber; name) and last_names(linenumber; name)

These names were extracted from a file and the linenumber tells me the line number from the file where the value came from.

e.g.

first_names (1, John) & last_names(3,Doe)

first_names(17,Jane) & last_names(23,Doe)

So I'm trying to pair the first name with the correct last name. The difference in the two line numbers is not consistent so something like join on last_name.linenumber = first_name.linenumber 2 is not going to work. What I do know is that the linenumber for the first_name will always be the MAX(first_name.linenumber) that is less than the last_name.linenumber.

So looking at the examples above. There is

no first_name.linenumber = 2. There is no first_name.linenumber between 18 and 22.

Any suggestions or ideas?

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