Then I clicked on the bitcoin logo and Now I have a propper screen for the first time telling me my sync status in days/weeks etc... pretty much what I wanted really.
it`s still not the -qt thing, but it`s progress!

It's hard to tell exactly what you did when you say "you clicked the logo"....
I can`t find any power management setting in ubunto that deals with the lid being closed, it does go to "sleep" too and require a password to log back in again, but I switched all that off along with screen dimming and time-outs, the lid however... well that`s just not catered for in any place I can see.
One of the things of running Linux, is that you'll find yourself Googling any problem you have, and most of the time you'll find
a solution.
I couldn`t find anything called tarball anythere?
It's the
.tar.gz file
Why did I chose Linux? well I really REALLY! don`t trust windows, like not even a little bit! and I`v many mention about linux being a bit like bitcoin itself, open source and by and for the people and pretty much decentralised. so it seemed like a good idea at the time! LOL
of course looking back, I`m starting to wonder if it was such a good idea now?

You're going to find a steep learning curve, but once you get it, you'll probably like it. But that includes Googling stuff and reading things.
For what it's worth: I've never liked the Snap system, and try to avoid it. I prefer to install install packages normally.
well my new screen says I only have 20 hours left to go now, much better than I expected really.
Chances are it's a bit optimistic, especially when your 8 GB RAM starts becoming a limitation (because
chainstate grows to 12 GB during sync).