I haven't read the whole thread so I apologize if this has ben said earlier.

If you have $1000 to invest look to put that in some etf like SPY. Do not use margin. Actually many brokers will not let use use margin with $1000 and you can't do short term trading because of the PDT rules. You have to have more than $25,000 in your account to make more than 4 day-trades a week. One of my favourite stock is ACH, this could go lower but it is trading at such a low PE and has a good history of growth, I'll seriously look into it. Please do your own research too.

Scottrade or Ameritrade will be fine as brokers. If you are a serious trader look into Interactive Brokers.

Good Luck.