That's awesome about going to meet Ed and Elaine Brown! I'm jealous.... a pointer though: Have you been in contact with them yet? I hear that Ed is pretty paranoid, so if you're expecting to just show up at his front door and be let in, you might be disappointed. I think his thinking is that anyone could be a fed.
I'm curious whether you think his house could really be deemed a compound. I know people who have visited him, and just describe it as a really nice house. I think the mainstream media is just sensationalizing it (as well as possibly trying to get the public to align against him) by calling it a compound.