Styles for Dummies

[Jawelin]

Hi.
I'm completely a newbie at styles matter...
So, before starting, I would know something to avoid stupid mistakes, almost possible.
I would create a second style for my board with new images, new colors and of course different button sets.
I have also already installed (but not activated with a link to users) the drop down box hack for choosing the style, as is on forumhome of this board... along with +20 of other hacks...

Well. My questions are:
1) As my board is open and fully functional, I would expect I could work at the new style without conflicting with the default one. When finished, could I swap the default and the new one style numbers to make '1' the new one ?
2) The new style should include all new templates or could I reuse almost all of the previous one ? I modified for hacking or my personalizations about an half of them, and definitively wouldn't duplicate everyone: otherwise, when I'll install new hacks I should mantain two series of templates. And it'll uncomfortable.
3) Have you - professional hackers/webmasters - a simple checklist of the exact sequence of the operations to do when startin with a new style to add to default ?

Thank you and sorry for such silly questions, but the title of topic speaks well !