Due to a mass of trolling, only established posters are able to post in non-newbie sections. You are considered "established" if you have spent 4 hours online and have made 5 posts.

If you have really good posts, you can post a request for preemptive whitelisting in the appropriate topic.

Also:
- You must have made one post in order to send PMs.
- You need 10 posts to put a link in your signature.

Note that it may take up to 10 minutes for your PM or posting permissions to be granted.

Lets hope for a wonderful year for bitcoin and the bitcoiners!

Bitcoin doesn't need to have a one-size fits all client / user model.  

Casual users might wish to use a javascript wallet, such as the My Wallet from http://Blockchain.info/wallet and http://StrongCoin.com (though know that both have fees when withdrawing).  Or a paper-based wallet -- http://www.bitaddress.org
Or a wallet on your mobile, like BitcoinSpinner, or BitPay (which is a mobile front-end to an Instawallet)

None of these methods require the Blockchain to be downloaded.