If you are serious about running a node I would recommend learning some command line tools. It's not that hard and there are a lot of good resources out there to help. I started running a node 3 years ago and had no command line experience at all but have learnt as I go. Command line is not really programming, it's just commands entered in a way that the OS reads them logically. Some of the issues you explain below can be easily diagnozed yourself in command line, like the bitcoin-cli getnetworkinfo command noted below. Editing the bitcoin.conf file was really intimidating at first, but once you practice and understand what you're doing it's pretty easy. I use this YouTube channel as my go to source for Node and command line tools: https://www.youtube.com/@MinistryofNodes You can even setup one on one sessions with Ketan to help you further if you need. 3 years on, I feel a lot more confident running my node (I now run two). Good luck.