Well, we originally bought a Coleman Mesa from M&M, but we saw the Trailmanors then and fell in love with them. The problem was the price. We asked them to watch for used ones for us, but they said they rarely saw used ones around here. Well, last year I stumbled upon this message board and saw there was a Trailmanor for sale in Toledo. It was in the right area and for the right price. We drove down looked at it and bought it. We've only used it 2 times so far. So we are kind of new at it too. We did have a brake issue and my DH called M&M and they insisted we should take it in to have it checked out and if they needed to be replaced it would be somewhere around $500. Well, the DH is quite the handyman, and he pulled the wheels and discovered some stuff had broke and fallen off the brakes (I'm not good at technical stuff, so I'm not sure exactly what fell apart). Anyway, he went to General Trailer in Brownstown and bought new brakes and rotors for about $140 and put them on and they work great now. We never had to deal with M&M with the Mesa so I'm not sure how reliable they are. I know the price for the brakes seem ridiculous.
Usually if we buy anything we go to Camper's World in Belleville or to General Trailer in Brownstown.
As for camping, we have a 9 (almost 10) year old boy. We homeschool so we generally camp in spring and fall. (Although we went to Kentucky last week.) We are heading for the UP of Michigan for 2 weeks in September when the kids are back to school. We like the state parks here in Michigan. Our 2 favorites are Ft. Custer Recreation Area in Battle Creek and Hartwick Pines State Park in Grayling. With small kids Ft. Custer is nice cuz Binder Zoo, the Kellogg's Factory and the Air Zoo are all close by.
As for tips, I would use this message board to find out anything you want, so I would make sure you become a site member.
Who knows maybe we'll see you camping someday.
Cathy