I'm just trying, as you suggest, to get experience with the forum with a supportive group as my audience, before making a fool of myself before a larger (and not necessarily supportive) audience in the general forum. My first question is this: when I attempted to use the Advanced Editor, I couldn't enter anything in the Post: window that was apparently allocated to that purpose. Why not?
Apparently, the "Advanced Editor" is so advanced that it doesn't show a cursor (at least, not on my system). Try just typing away and see what happens.