[Plugin: cubePM] the_author() appears twice, once before use?

New user but haven’t been able to solve a problem I have despite searching the forums.

I am editing the cubePM plugin to suit my needs a bit better, the modification is to basically have a custom widget to send the post author a message about the current post.

I have managed to create a new shortcode and have the new form working, you can select the username you want to send to and the message will send.

I decided to automatically fill in the recipient field with the_author(); This works fine but for some reason the_author() gets published above the form?

My code in the plugin which generates the form:

function cpm_page_new_form2(){
	if(isset($_REQUEST['cpm_recipient'])){
		$cpm_recipient = $_REQUEST['cpm_recipient'];
	}
	else{
		$cpm_recipient = '';
	}
	if(isset($_REQUEST['cpm_subject'])){
		$cpm_subject = $_REQUEST['cpm_subject'];
	}
	else{
		$cpm_subject = '';
	}
	if(isset($_REQUEST['cpm_message'])){
		$cpm_message = $_REQUEST['cpm_message'];
	}
	else{
		$cpm_message = '';
	}
	$html = '<form method="post" action="?cpm_action=new">';
	$html .= '<input type="hidden" name="cpm_form_submit" value="1" />';
	$html .= '<p><input type="hidden" name="cpm_recipient" id="cpm_recipient" value="'.the_author().'" /></p>';
	$html .= '<p><label for="cpm_subject">'.__('Subject', 'cubepm').':</label><br /><input type="text" name="cpm_subject" id="cpm_subject" value="'.$cpm_subject.'" /></p>';
	$html .= '<p><label for="cpm_message">'.__('Message', 'cubepm').':</label><br /><textarea name="cpm_message" id="cpm_message">'.$cpm_message.'</textarea></p>';
	$html .= '<p><input type="submit" name="cpm_submit" id="cpm_submit" value="'.__('Send PM', 'cubepm').' ?" /></p>';
	$html .= '</form>';
	return $html;
}

the output in html

<div class="singletab">
	Tyler168
	<div class="cubepm">
		<div class="cpm-header"></div>
		<h2>Send PM</h2>
		<form method="post" action="?cpm_action=new">
			<input type="hidden" name="cpm_form_submit" value="1" />
			<p><input type="hidden" name="cpm_recipient" id="cpm_recipient" value="Tyler168" /></p>
			<p><label for="cpm_subject">Subject:</label><br />
			<input type="text" name="cpm_subject" id="cpm_subject" value="" /></p>
			<p><label for="cpm_message">Message:</label><br />
			<textarea name="cpm_message" id="cpm_message"></textarea></p>
			<p><input type="submit" name="cpm_submit" id="cpm_submit" value="Send PM ?" /></p>
		</form>
	</div>
</div>

If I swap the_author() for something basic like name then the form will have the recipient ‘name’ and the_author() does no appear above the form.

Really confused by this one, it’s my first serious attempt at modifying a plugin, and this is the last hurdle for me.

If it gets sorted I will be emailing the creator with my new version to release.

Any help greatly appreciated