thanks Joseph! that got me on the right track. it wasn't quite...
from django.models.mypp.group import Group but... from django.models.mypp import groups that was needed. one problem with django i guess is figuring out what exactly are the correct names and hierarchy, but i just took the clue from the import line in tutorial 1 for the interactive shell and imported the module 'groups', since I guess Group is actually just the name of the class def, and the latter version seems more consistent with what I see elsewhere in django. But most important i didn't realize i could import this directly into a method of this class that will become a module. thanks again.