Joel, et.al.

OK, take me off the Unknown section and place me in California with
a 1987 Vanagon, Wolfsburg Edition.  I'm a new, first time owner and
have a question or two since lurking here for a week and a half.
My mechanical experience has been limited to oil changes, minor
tune up type stuff, so it's marginal at best.
  
There's been quite a lot of dicussion about coolant and it seems
that the concensus is that non-phosphate coolant is desirable, if not
a must.  Is this a correct assessment?  A mention was made of some blue 
stuff from VW dealers.  Can color alone differentiate phosphate from 
non-phosphate? I have what appears to be the usual green stuff in my 
Vanagon now, I have no idea what brand it is.  Should I change this stuff out?  

Also, my "low coolant" idiot light started blinking last week.  
I checked the coolant level and it was well above the "max" line.  Whoever 
filled this up must have used another input than the usual filler tank
behind the license plate since the level was way above the filler cap.  The 
engine is running at normal temperature according to the temp guage and the
electric fan doesn't start up.  Does the temp guage and the cooling fan
work off of separate sensors?  I downloaded the Service Bulletins and found
two references to this coolant light problem so it must happen rather
frequently.  I'll look into these bulletins further but I would like to ask 
if anyone has experienced this problem and perhaps have a recommendation on 
what I should try first.

I've wanted a Vanagon for years and I love this thing!  I don't want
to screw it up so any advice, recommendations, etc will be greatly 
appreciated.

Thanks,

Steve