Verified answer

Warm, moist air, and a cold front with a large temperature change.

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Isn't a thunderstorm basically where a cold front and warm moist air have a violent fight?

The last thunderstorm to come through Kansas City was a pansy because the cold front overtook the warm air with little resistance. If we had warm moist air pushing up from the gulf, it would have been a stronger storm.

The ingredients are a cold front (cool dry air from the north) and warm moist air cycling up from the south (especially the gulf) and they collide violently. I don't know the particulars, but I think the warm moist air hits the cold front as if it were a wall and builds up vertically against it with the higher the clouds the stronger the storm. And the cold front will push the warm moist air creating a squaw line the storms center along. The cold air essentially pushes the warm moist air as a squaw line like a big buff adult man could place his hand on a young skinny guys chest and push him away. Even though the young skinny guy is swinging and fighting, he's getting moved. So I guess ultimately the cold dry air (cold front) is stronger. As the cold front moves through an area (usually moves southeastward), everything behind it becomes cooler or cold, the temperature can drop a ton in just a couple hours.

warm humid air rising fast usually by a colder drier air mass behind it

you will need rising columns of air that mix charged particles in the air, which will allow in a release of electric energy