As far as the credit goes, everyone has an opinion, and each one is valid, but I would reccommend doing a little research of your own.
Here's a few places to start:
http://money.cnn.com/index.html?cnn=yes They have a personal finance area that also has a "Money 101" section. There's alot of information there. It would be good to browse through.
http://moneycentral.msn.com/home.asp They usually have some good articles on personal finance, and they also have a "planning" section that has a few calculators, as well as more good info.
There are a ton of other sites as well. I would suggest looking through a few of them to find some info on building your credit. I'm sure there's a few articles about moving out for the first time too, and what to realisticly expect.
Hope that helps.