I use Ancestry.com too. It isn't cheap, as noted, but I've always been able to rationalize it so it doesn't bother me too badly.  :)  ..  It's answered a lot of questions for me, built a good-sized base of relatives, and supplied hours of interesting searching. I love being able to search the old original documents, and since my family has been in our little township for 8 generations, the old censuses are fascinating for finding all the neighbors I've always heard about thru the years.  There are errors, and when you get back a couple hundred years, you have to apply simple common sense to some of the other people's trees that are available.....when both parents were dead by 1803, it's highly unlikely that they had a child born in 1820.  Some people just enter data when they find a record or a trail without thinking thru the logics of what they're doing. But that's part of what makes the whole system intriguing. Go for it, and enjoy!