One thing that Mastodon newcomers may not realize is how easy it is to turn Mastodon for web into essentially a Tweetdeck clone, with columns for search/compose, home, notifications, and any lists you've set up. It takes literally seconds.
Here's what mine looks like right now:
Two excellent, in-depth guides to Mastodon, which should answer many of your questions, are here:
1. An Increasingly Less-Brief Guide to Mastodon by joyeusenoelle: https://github.com/joyeusenoelle/GuideToMastodon
2. Nikodemus' Guide to Mastodon: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1D9gfeKg_-hlsU66R-dLEvUeyMsqEfyIx2pnfUeX0t_E/edit#heading=h.j95atvlbfrn5
*PLEASE BOOST THIS POST* so more people can see this information in their timelines, thank you so much! ❤️
To boost, just click on the boost button below this post, as indicated by the red arrow in the attached image (the icon may vary a bit, by app):