[Wylug-help] User config settings

[David Noble]

Help again please, for this newbie,
                                   For the last 12 to 18 months I have been 
trying numerous linux distros, including Slackware, Mandrake, Fedora,
Suse, Knoppix, and most recently Mepis.  Mepis I find so far, does
what I require and finds all my pretty old hardware.  
                                   As I have been continually tinkering ( and 
learning a little about linux ) I have always logged in as root.  Yes 
I know it's not good practice !!   However now that I have a system
that at least so far,  works and does what I want, I feel that I should
now set up a user account.  On doing so I find that  the
configuring of things like Desktop settings, Kppp, Kmail etc. that I did
as root all need to be to done again for me as " user " .
                                   Presumably all these settings exist as 
config files somewhere.  Can someone tell me where I might
find them and if it's possible to simply copy them to a similar
location ( wherever that might be ) in the "user"  account files, as this
would save an awful lot of time.  I am, and likely to remain,  the only
"user " if this will make any difference.
                                             
                                    Many thanks in advance,  David