Hello and thanks for reading my plea for help.
As the title indicates, new house and pool, but far from being brand new.
This is an in-ground, gunite/plaster that is kidney shaped.

Before filling the pool up this year, I had to drain it to get the coping and tiling replaced. The plaster/gunite of the pool was in good condition according to the company I had refurbishing the pool. This all happened about July 9th, 2012 and finished up around July 16th .

I thought that I would get to start it up, but the 2” copper pipes that were above/below ground stubbing to the 2” poly lines ended up being pretty hole filled. I rebuilt all the copper pieces with 2” PVC. I used unions, valves, and bungs all made from PVC to remove the copper and brass valves that were worn out. All the parts were around $80 and 8.5 hours of work/store time while the temp was 102 F outside.

Finally to the pool…

So I picked up the Wally World HTH 6 Test kit.
The contractors I had out estimated 17,000-gallon pool.
pH is 8.2
CL 5
Br 10
TA 80
TH 140

CYA Couldn’t the test to work
CC and FC no idea how to get these.

The pool has the following hardware:
Hayward S244T Sand Filter
Hayward CL220 Chlorinator
New 1 HP Pump Motor
Polaris 380 (was NIB)

In-ground Gunite/Plaster Pool
Neighbors est. 15 y.o.
Diving Board
Est 17,000 gallons

I have no idea what I am doing and am reading continuously to learn.
Any quick points before I have a green swamp are greatly appreciated!
The answers from experts are probably a lot faster than my learning curve. ☺