ripple... account... no wallet... ridiculously opaque

[birr]

I went to ripple.com, opened an account, deposited some BTC and bought ripple, thought I was getting off to a good start.
Sent some xrp to Bitstamp (included destination tag), bitstamp sent it back.  Methinks no biggie, I'll google around and figure this out.
Found a link "how to grant trust to Bitstamp."
http://www.nofiatcoin.com/how-to-grant-trust-to-bitstamp.html
Says "Once you are logged in Ripple and on the Wallet page"
Well, there is no wallet page.  So I google some more and find the link to the ripple client, where I can start a new ripple wallet.
But I already have an account and a ripple balance.  Am I going to be starting another account by creating a wallet?  It's not asking for my existing ripple name.

[Sukrim]

Bitstamp is a gateway, they don't deal with XRP, they issue BTC, USD etc.

What exactly are you trying to do? You don't need to add a trust line to Bitstamp to send them funds and if you want to deposit BTC there, why would you use Ripple in the first place?!

[birr]

You don't need to add a trust line to Bitstamp to send them funds

Thanks; didn't know that.
My aim is to deposit dollars on Bitstamp without the expense of international wire transfers.
There's a new service offered by snapswap that enables U.S. citizens to send dollars directly from their bank accounts using ripple.   So I'm trying to figure it all out.  Sending a few xrp to Bitstamp was an experiment. -- don't hold it against me  
I just wanna make some dollars go like this:
bank --> ripple --> Bitstamp
I've bought and sold hundreds of bitcoins.  I'm hardly a crypto newbie.
I only started with ripple this morning, and I'm still at the stage where it seems unnecessarily obscure and frustrating.

[Sukrim]

So you would trust SnapSwap, send USD via their instructions to them and then send USD to Bitstamp.
You can also send USD to Bitstamp if you own BTC, XRP or Dogecoins - just send USD to them and the client will ask you which currency you want to use to pay.

Ripple is mainly about making payments, not about using XRP for these payments.

[birr]

I bought a couple hundred xrp, I'm well aware what it's for and what it's not for.
Here's the post where snapswap announced the service on their blog:
http://blog.snapswap.vc/2014/08/instant-deposit-from-major-us-banks.html
When I saw that, I went and opened and activated a ripple account.
I suppose the next step is, open a snapswap account.

Edit:  I opened a snapswap acct
"Welcome to SnapSwap! Both your identity and proof of residence were accepted! You can now add funds to your Ripple account using SnapSwap."
I haven't made a deposit yet, but there's a button on the snapswap website.
Max $300, fee of 1%+$.29
Was hoping for better.