BTW Expat, if you sign on with a new silver (offline) account/gamertag you generally get a free one month gold membership as a taster.
This gives you the month to play online, download etc all you want.
So you can see if you like it that way.
Probably best to play a game capable of multiplayer for a few weeks beforehand to get used to the layout, how to play it etc. before going online or the 12 year olds will open a new can of whoopass
