[newbie] terminal and backspace

[lalala lalala]

Hi... after 2 GRUELING months of installtion question
and FAQs.. I finally got Linux to run properly.

I have two questions:
1) how do u enable backspace to work? 
2) whenever I open up a terminal (or a terminal
emulator), I can't see anything but pitch black
screen... it won't even show "/usr/blahblah..>" how do
I fix this?

Thanx in advance 

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