Don't worry about 2&3. If you were teaching your kid to play touch football, do you toss him into a game with Drew Brees? Ignore rental car guy, ignore mileage runs, start with something easy, simple, and achievable.

For instance, back in the day, my husband and I each applied for an American Express Card, gaining us (I think) 25K apiece, all you need to book domestic travel to the 49 states and the however many Canadian provinces for a low level award. We then booked award tickets to Calgary during June, it didn't rain (well, not much), and we had a great trip for total air cost of $20 all-in.

If you have good credit, you really can't mess up too bad. Each adult traveler should apply for the credit card, get the miles, and then book the trip. You have now gone step by step and experienced a success. You can build from there.

Don't try to leap from kindergarten math to pudding guy math. You can apply for a credit card, get enough miles for a trip, and book it in a very short period of time if you are patient with yourself and willing to learn things a bit at a time. If you want to jump right ahead to advanced calculus, you just make yourself crazy, get discouraged, and give up.

Look, nothing much bad can happen if you apply for the "wrong" credit card or if you apply for "too few" credit cards. You'll get some trip out of it. Maybe not a cruise to the top secret Flyertalk champagne tasting headquarters in Myamar but you'll get a trip out of it. And you'll learn. And you can always apply for more later.

You're getting yourself overwhelmed by slamming together beginner and advanced material. Ride the tricycle before you ride the bicycle before you ride the unicycle in mid-air on a telephone wire.