Storytelling Alice v. Alice for child

Good afternoon,
I am not a professional teacher, but have introduced my 9yo daughter to Storytelling Alice. I'd like to solicit advice on a few questions that I have regarding her development.

1. What is considered to be an "appropriate" time to introduce regular Alice to a child? I've read that STA is geared toward middle school and Alice is geared toward higher learning, but should I let my daughter run with STA until she's shows declining interest or are there particular skills that I could evaluate to determine that she's ready for the next step? It seems that support and a larger audience would be benefits of having her step up to regular Alice.

2. I read the list of schools using Alice, but does anyone know of schools using Storytelling Alice?

3. I'm not a programmer by trade, but I have worked in the computer field on the system side for 20 years or so. What would be good skills for me to learn prior to attempting to teach her Alice, at least until she gets into programming courses at school? For example, would a basic understanding of Java be a good step?

4. I would imagine that many of the conferences, or short courses, would be held during the summer given the number of education professionals posting here. Is there a list of such events posted somewhere that might be of interest to me or her?

Any additional advice or guidance would be appreciated.

Thank you,
Dave
tom_sawyer70@yahoo.com