Is the gnome we are talking about that one that for reaching the taskbar you have to move the mouse to the top of the screen and then immediately to the bottom every time?
I'm not well informed, but I wouldn't be surprised if in some places it wouldn't be legal to sell that kind of cords (because of being a safety hazard and such).
I'm also a beginner and I noticed that debian let me install a lot of possible desktops. So I installed all of them, and I can switch on the password screen which one to open. I'm trying some stuff this way.