I did mine about 3 years ago - Ah has summed it up perfectly.
Re the COV - CAA was a pain in the *** releasing my details, and took a long time.The CASA guy dealing with it was going spare and said they were the worst he had come across!
Re the exams and studying - the most useful bit of advice I could give you is study the official docs intensivly, its not about knowing the information, its about being to find it quickly!