Thanks, ResearchGuy. The fog is lifting, and I now have a pretty good idea of what self-publishing and POD are. I've reached the same conclusions as you. If I'm hearing you correctly, "authentic" self-publishing may be the route to take if it is expected that one will sell hundreds or even thousands of books; otherwise, POD would be an acceptable option.
I've read some of your other postings, and like you, I know of others who have been quite successful at "authentic" self-publishing. One in particular wrote an excellent non-fiction book, had a terrific marketing plan, and if we are to place credence in Amazon.com's ranking, it is selling reasonably well (it consistently has been between the 10,500 to 25,000). I do believe that success in self-publishing is less rare than winning the lottery. I know of some success stories with self-publishing, but I know of no one who has won the lottery. I once won $3, if that can be considered winning the lottery.
At this stage, being the traditionalist that I am, I've submitted eight queries to what I consider to be top-shelf agents and thus far have received two requests for partials and no direct rejections (although to be honest it's been about two weeks, and as "they" say, silence is often a sign of disinterest). Still, I'd like to keep all my options open if things don't pan out with the agent route.
As you might has guessed, I'm new to AW. I've enjoyed reading your postings as well as many others here.