Requesting/begging for merits isn't the right way to go about it, you'd have to actually make posts that will meet the criteria of other users and merit sources, if you make it a habit of begging for merits, other users would just ignore you, and then it becomes even more difficult to earn merits.

As for 'how things work', if you actually did read the links posted above, then you would know how things work/what will happen if or when you earn a merit, for you, it wouldn't be much, you'd become a jr member when your activity catches up, if you stay at just one merit, you still wouldn't be able to join the merit process/system/economy as you will have just 0.5 Smerits which is not sendable, you can also then add a signature, and a few others.