Thank you all for responding and helping. I would have most likely been ok just logging into game and playing as usual but I didn't understand the process at the time and couldn't understand why I was still in the trial after purchasing the game. On my account-transaction page it showed my status as "queing" so I now know that my trial would have become the subscribed game if I had waited a bit.
But of course I didn't do that.
To purchase the game I clicked the Upgrade button from the log in screen which only presented one choice - a set called Battle Chest that is the original game plus the Burning Crusade expansion. Since "Cataclysm" was on my trial sign in, and again, not being familiar with Blizzard games, I thought the purchase would be the game plus all expansions a la EQ. Thus my confusion began.
I won't go through the long version, but, due to my own impatience, I ended up having to uninstall/scan/defrag/reinstall the game. At least I'm in the process of reinstalling...lol. Now I know that purchasing from the trial does not include Cataclysm (nor Wrath of the Lich King for that matter), and I read a post on the WoW forums that explained what each expansion contained. I am really happy to hear that I have the same world as everyone else, just not access to higher levels, etc. until further purchase of expansions.
Now my account page shows my status as active and I peeked into the game for a few while it's still installing and do see a difference from the trial so all is good and really looking forward to playing.
Thank you again!
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Terrillian Mistfyre
Owner/Operator of The Redhead Express
Intellectually honest, not politically correct