DSLR video and AVCHD

I've been fighting against the Panasonic GH-1 AVCHD file format.
Finally I've got around to surfing for answers, and in the process discovered other useful stuff.

http://www.reelseo.com/how-to-edit-avchd/
http://www.reelseo.com/hd-video-dslr-camera/

It's really what?
So fat I haven't shelled out the ££ for premiere, or final cut, or well anything yet.
Still researching before I spend.

I am lucky that work got me the latest version of premiere pro before AVCHD took off as a standard, and it natively supports AVCHD. I know it is seriously expensive and the learning curve can be steep, but it is worth it. I also have an old copy of FCP on my mac at home and I love it, but my computer at home really isn't fast enough to run it. I am sure the new versions support AVCHD as well. Also there are "light" versions of both these apps available and they are a great option. I am not sure about apple but adobe offers a trial version which might be worth a download.