Its official I have joined the Crypto-Community! My DIVE head first into Cryptocurrency.

Well hello all already involved in the community.

Thank you for your tutorials all over steemit on how the cryptocurrency works I read endlessly so I'm not gonna tag any one person here! The Steemit community made it possible.

I went though all the steps of researching what cryptocurrencies(CC) are I'm not saying I am any pro or anything yet. I just did a bit of homework.
I started my foray into CC about 1 week ago when I joined steemit, by just landing on this site as I stumbled around the web.
Thanks for having me!

After that I made an account on Coinbase.(Read there are better alternative to coinbase but seemed to be the easiest) Today I took the plunge and bought some Litecoin (hoping the price will continue to rise) and to get a feel for how the wallet system work. After that I proceeded to use blocktrade to exchange the litecoin to STEEM. I was very worried that I just lost like $25 usd when I did that.
Then moments later to my relief I saw the note I wrote in the transfer appear in my steem wallet. AWESOME FEELS!

After doing that I figured maybe I can set up some mining and that is were I am now and I now have many questions....

Currently I am using MinerGate. I don't know if it good or not considering this is my first attempt at mining but seeming like the best choice for someone as inexperienced as me to the world I dove head first into. (And a windows user :'( )
So far I have reaped 1 coin worth of QCN (QuazarCoin). Not a very lucrative coin. But i switched it up with a bit more research into the mining pool offerings from MinerGate.

My Questions

What is the best exchange to use to change ALTcoins to LiteCoin or BTC or ETH?

How come the mined currency don't go to my wallet until there is a certain amount?

Should I hold ALTcoins or trade them to BTC/etc.? ()

Is mining a dead art for CPU/GPU mining?

How/Where do you exchange lesser know currencies like QCN, FNC

Should I make Accounts on Exchanges or remain Anonymous? Which protects my transfers more?

Thanks for all the info you guys have already provided. Looking forward to exploring the Crypto world with you all in the future.

With love from the newest member of the Crypto-Community,
@babyfist