I’ve long been aware of the rx macro in Emacs as a way of lispifying regular expressions but it always seemed too complicated to learn. Now Francis Murillo (I think) has published an excellent post on using the rx macro. The post has an explanation of the syntax and several worked examples.
If you are one of those people who have a hard time writing or reading regular expressions, you should take a look. It may make writing those regular expressions easier, especially if you feel comfortable with Elisp.