So I've been setting up JMS Multi-Sites these past few days and now I seem to be running into some issues, so I'd like to take a step back and ask if I'm going about things properly in the first place.

My understanding is if I'd like to share users and content between the master and slave sites I create, that process should be initiated via a template for replication purposes.

We use Rochen currently for hosting and it seems in order to have root DB privileges with CREATE & SHOW VIEW you have to have a more robust account than their entry level at $8.95 per month - in order to access root level privileges with Rochen it runs $149.95 per month.

Am I approaching the issue of sharing users & content between sites correctly?

And Does anyone have experience with Rochen, or other hosts that could provide more cost-effective hosting for root privileges? Or is there another way around this using Rochen?

Thanks

Concerning the user sharing, this is correct that you have to create a JMS Template to define the sharing rule that must be used when creating the new site.

Concerning you hosting company, I don't know this one but I can tell you that we are using a shared hosting at hostgator.com for a very low price at 7.95 USD per month. (baby plan).
The hosting provide should be able to grant you MySQL user for free when working with shared hosting.
If you want to grant the MySQL user yourself, of course this require a more expensive hosting.

See with the support of your hosting provider to ask them grant your MySQL user.

I'll try talking with them again, unfortunately - the attitude they gave me was - "Why we would provide something for you that is available in another plan?"

Gives me a pretty bad impression of Rochen, even though I do like the tools they provide - I doubt I'll host with them again based on this experience and their lack of customer oriented support.