Thanks for the various replies. I think I'm getting the hang of it more now. The difficulty I've been having is that at first, in the tutorial, you are told exactly what to do. You don't want to do anything else in case you disrupt the tutorial scripts. But you tend to carry on a bit blinkered after that - and don't realise you've largely been left to yourself.

Also, it's easy to carry on regarding the Senate as your tutor - and do everything they tell you in the order they tell you. This may not always be a good thing! Although they do seem to pay pretty well.

Severous says he played to the end of the prologue: 50 provinces? Are there really that many on that small map?

Any specific hints/strategies/reminiscences of the prologue campaign would still be most welcome.