Thanks for such quick replies! I'm not as worried about the TA now. I did turn one of my eyeball jets in the shallow shelf area to break the water surface, and we should be getting some rain and thus fresh water in the next week or two. Thankfully my "pool school" was free so at least I didn't pay extra for him to raise the TA! And I'm relieved it won't be too much of an issue if it stays slightly higher.

The pool package came with the automatic chlorinator where you stack the trichlor pucks in it. I was planning to do a combination of the trichlor (on a low dispenser setting) and bleach, because it was a totally new pool fill in the fall and isn't overstabilized.

I am curious about the relationship between CYA and the required level of free chlorine--is that something I can find in a chart somewhere on the site?

I also just bought the simple OTO red and yellow test kit for quick chlorine checks because I thought the same thing you guys mentioned about the Taylor test kit--I'm going to be running out of the reagents and powder quickly as I try to get the pool set up properly. The whole reason my chlorine got so low is that my "pool school" visit was delayed so I fell through the cracks between them coming out periodically and the guy arriving for pool school. Plus my test kit arrived only the day before. Hopefully with the guidelines on this board it will be a smooth summer. Thanks so much!