I met DH when I was 17 and he was 18. He asked me to marry him on our first date. I declined, but agreed to keep dating He proposed when he was 21 and I was 20, and we were married a year after that. We've now been married for 17 years.

Like Nelle, we didn't live together before we were married. We think the "success" (for want of a better word) of marriage preparation lies in discussing values, communication and conflict styles, default positions (ie what you've been brought up with), expectations etc, rather than test-running living arrangements. In my opinion, if you can't work out the other stuff, then nothing will make the living arrangements work out.