AT&T confusion

My darling sister (she´s reading this, better be nice) gave me her old iphone (this makes her sound like a little angel, when the truth is that she was unable to use it because it was locked) and I thought I would use it here in the US.

Went to the AT&T-store where the manager assured me that it would work just fine, I just had to put in an American SIM-card, which he gave me, and call AT&T and they would just set up a plan for me.

I went home, a long grueling 10 miles, happy as a clam, just to spend over an hour on the phone with representatives for said phone company who had no idea what they are talking about.

First two people told me that sure, they would love to do business with me but unfortunately I was calling the wrong department and transferred me. Third person got really flustered and said I needed to talk to the "Iphone people", gave me a phone number and then disconnected me. Called said phone number, ended up with a really frustrated Apple rep who could not for the life of her understand why an AT&T rep would transfer me to her, since she just sold phones and I clearly already had one. She then promptly transferred me back to AT&T, who then dropped my call.

Had to start back at the beginning again and called the number I had gotten in the store, talked to one lovely lady who assured me it wasn´t a problem, it was really easy to do, all she had to do was... transfer me. Dropped my call again.

Once again from the top, this time got transferred to a woman who seemed to know what she was talking about. Unfortunately, she told me it was impossible for me to do it over the phone, and I had to go to a corporate store. The nearest one is about two hours away. I asked her if she could think of any alternatives, so that I at least could use the phone as an ipod touch, or maybe I could go to the store here in Sequim? She went to ask a manager - and I got disconnected again.

Knowing I would have to travel two hours to unlock a phone that I would then have to pay 60 dollars a month to use, I opted to spend a couple of hours on the net trying to find ways to unlock it. Not being particularly experienced in these types of things, it took me all morning but I can now say that i am proud owner of a WORKING iphone! Its not a phone per say, but at least I can use it as an ipod touch.

For those of you who want me to have an actual cell, with a number that you can call - don´t worry, I ordered one of those too...