cheers guys, lots of helpful advice there.
the house i saw today is bigger than i could have hoped for as the first place i'll be renting on my own. The bedroom is big and has a built in wardrobe, the kitchen is quite large too, and the lounge (which will my home cinema room) is really huge

and has a bay window which will be the perfect place to put my 50" TV (although i'll probably decide later against putting it somewhere it might get rained on if i leave the windows open). The bathroom isn't massive but it's big enough.
The location isn't particularly noisy either. There will be cars going past the road a few dozen yards off to the side but the road itself should be fairly quiet traffic wise. There is a nightclub about 5 mins walk away so i expect i'll get all the goths walking past my road on a friday, but that's far better than the chavs

and i'd probably still be awake at that time, or in the club with them
i wanted to find out if i was letting myself in for lots of problems or hidden costs and you've helped reassure me that there's nothing that's really going to bother me.
all i gotta do now is wait for the agent to get back to me with the measurements for the washing machine space and fridge/freezer space to see if my stuff will fit in, and if that's all ok, i think i'll put in an offer