Thank you.
Agreed. Zoom on a cell phone looks pretty bad on the other end. Use the computer if you can.
^^^^ This. This. This. ^^^^
You must practice with Zoom itself if you can, but practicing with any other camera-audio meetup app will also be useful. IIRC, Google Meets is part of Chrome so can be used by anyone with the Chrome browser, maybe? Hopefully you can find a friend willing to just chat with you for a bit while you get used to things.
I downloaded Zoom, tested the audio and video, and it looks like the laptop camera and mic both work. I appreciate everyone’s help, and will report back.
I’ll also keep reading this thread for any advice.
I wouldn’t go quite that far, but yeah, a lot of people used Zoom (and/or something similar) during the pandemic, which I guess should encourage @bobot that it’s relatively easy to get the hang of.
The test tutorial thing worked well enough. It prompted me about how to enable my laptop’s mic, which I’m sure I disabled years ago due to potential Big Brother snooping.
One thing I don’t think I saw mentioned is making sure you have decent lighting. make sure any strong lights or the sun is in front of you, otherwise you’ll look like you’re in witness protection or something. You might even want to pick up one of those circular lights at your local office supply store.
Another thing you might want to consider is choosing a background image or blurring your background.