Stephen, I have some of the same questions you have, but I think you're both missing an important fact. When you have people with established pedigrees who provide their DNA markers and you have a "real close" match (what that means is exactly what you're trying to get to the bottom of) then you are likely (to some mathematical certainty) to come from some portion of that same lineage/pedigree. This pedigree is the "family" that is only hypothesized based on knowing the pedigree. If your markers are one off from the known pedigree then that's a "real close" match no matter how you look at it. Also, if you just have DNA matches without a known pedigree it doesn't get you anywhere except to know the haplogroup (which may lead to a general geographic location). v/r Terrell