Lost, and still lost..

Help... I stayed up all night last night tossing and turning trying to make sense of it all. I understand that not all the questions could be answered, but I just need the big ones answered....

Stephen and I started watching LOST the first year we were married and with no TV that we walked to mother-in-law's house to catch it and have watched it relentlessly ever since. So I feel an attachment to a show that has left me breathless and not in a very good way. But I feel that if someone could just explain a little bit to me, I might feel better...

So they were dead from the very beginning or only after Hydrogen bomb? If they died after Hydrogen bomb then they were all waiting in some sideways "spirit world" for everyone to join together to "cross to the other side?" Then why wasn't Michael there and Echo? Because they died before Hydrogen bomb? And if they were dead from beginning then why weren't all those people there? Was there even an island or just hell? Or there was an island, with all the weird stuff, they blew it up/died ended up on spirit world, then who was on the island? There were 2 Jacks? They blew up their bodies into two people? I don't think so. So they are dead, waiting in alternate reality and also waiting on island to kill "smoke monster" and then does Hurley actually stay or does island sink? O alternate sideways reality actually took place somehow after the island was already destroyed at bottom of ocean because of Hydrogen bomb and then they were dead on island trapped in hell til they get rid of Locke and then they are released and join spirit in sideways world and then cross over? Okay, now I am rambling. Someone help me!!!!!!

Post revisited: After posting above post, I took a minute to google my questions, and man, I sure LOVE the Internet. My questions are answered, well, most of them anyway. It makes so much more sense and I can now go to bed peacefully... well, almost peacefully because of the sinus infection and last week of school upon me...