Now that I am using vim for everything I type, rather then just for configuring servers, I wan't to sort out the following trivialities. I tried to formulate Google search queries but the results didn't address my questions :D.

Question one: How do I yank and replace multiple times ?

Once I have something in the yank history (if that is what its called) and then highlight and use the 'p' char in command mode the replaced text is put at the front of the yank history; therefore subsequent replace operations do not use the the text I intended. I imagine this to be a usefull feature under certain circumstances but I do not have a need for it in my workflow.

Question two: How do I type text without causing the line to ripple forward ?

I use hard-tab stops to allign my code in a certain way -- e.g.,

FunctionNameX     ( lala * land               );
FunctionNameProto (                           );

When I figure out what needs to go into the second function, how do I insert it without move the text up ?

Question three Is there a way of having a uniform yank history across gvim instances on the same machine ? I have > 1 monitors. Just wondering, atm I am using highlight + mouse middle click.