Obverse is the "front" or "heads" side of the coin. Reverse is the "tails" side. And the third side (yes, third side) is the edge.
I like E-Bay, the sellers compete for your business (price) and e-bay has a money back guarantee. Stay far away from the clowns on TV such as coinvault. They will rip you off in a heart beat and smile as they do it.
I believe that Heritage auctions and Stacks auctions have fantastic deals and are a great place to learn and hone your skills, but you need to have some deep pockets with their lots. So my suggestion is to do your research using all the coin seller available to you (Cointalk auctions), keeping notes to make comparisons. At the same time saving your money to purchase the better value coin you want.
Where to shop for bargains is more of a bullion question. Bullion is very competitive with very little margin. Coin bargains are everywhere. The better question is how do you get better coin bargains. When you understand how you won't ask where.
Never heard of either of those that @sakata named. But, in fact, Google hasn't provided me with much info here in Baton Rouge. Two members here from New Orleans have, as I said earlier, already confirmed that my town is no friend to coin collectors. With the mention of pawn shops, I drove by one on the way home yesterday since he had a mention of rare coins on his sign I stopped. He had one average condition 1964 Kennedy Half that he said was worth $20. I thanked him for his time and left; I should've told him that a few hours earlier I had found a '64D quarter in much better condition in the Coin Star machine at the Walmart up the street, but didn't.
Wow! I thought I'd give this site a go, registered, browsed IHCs and WLHs. Most of the listings were in the thousands, with a few 1916 terribly worn WL Halves for about double what they go for on ebay. I just am not rich enough to have a coin collection at this level, that's very obvious to me.
You don't know what an obverse is but you are sure you have one of the rarest Lincoln cents in the world?
There is a directory of coin dealers that participate on Cointalk by zip code. If they have online shops also, they will be there. The prices will not be the lowest you see like on ebay, but the confidence level can be greater when buying. You can then use the profile page of each and see what posts they were in, and if anyone had good things or bad things to say, they are usually mentioned by customers. If the members here validate a dealer as being honest and wanting to help you as well as sell you what you want, that is great. Most are excellent with varieties and modern coins as well. And believe me I would not buy an ancient coin, not in hand, from any except a participating member of the Ancients forum group. High respect there from me. https://www.cointalk.com/directory/ Jim
It involved this OP asking about a coin that was initially identified as a small date and then changed to a large date which all agreed. You can find the thread under the OP profile if interested. The OP to his credit didn't do as some and try to convince everyone they were wrong, genially went from there. The OP admitted several times in his post he was a novice. Jim
Lol. Coins really intrigue me. And after work I just love going through rolls of pennies. I just have a lot to learn. But thank you to everyone who has helped me. I’m sure I have plenty more questions soon to be posted. Thank banks closed today.. so no new rolls
Tomorrow is a whole new day. It's always nice to see someone who is genuinely willing to learn, but will also accept mistakes. If you keep this attitude, you should do well.