ok so little help on my first attempt at pruning my upright Japanese maple... sorry if this rambles, new puppy making me a little sleep deprived.

I'm still very new to this entire gardening thing so please any advice you have feel free to share, simple things many people take for granted i have to spend a lot of painful trial and errors figuring out. That does not mean I'm not interested in beautiful, sometimes complicated plants, just understand I'm starting from little first hand experience.

Two Japanese maples are one of my garden projects and I have been reading up on it but am nervous and looking for any advice before actually making the first cut. There is a ton of info out on the web and some of it is contradictory, some of it just doesn't make sense to me.

little info: I planted this upright maple 2 years ago and have not pruned except dead wood as i read to leave them alone for 2-3 years, Also from what I have read I should prune in dormant times, mid summer (now) being one of them. I am in zone 8b, it gets full sun.

1- Should I prune the branches that look like they will one day grow into the fence (downward growing branches) and low on the trunk branches, or will they rise over time as the tree grows and the trunk gets taller?

2- How much rubbing or proximity is bad for branches, looking to the future, how do you determine that in a few years branches will be too close together, and when it should be pruned do you remove both branches, or keep one?

3- Branches that are leafless but not dead, should these be removed or leave them?

4- When pruning for this first time, how much total should be removed?

5- Branches that grow inward, but are curving outwards, should they be cut?

6- The tree grows towards the eastern rising sun, and it is getting thickest there, should that be trimmed now or allowed to keep growing, and if trimmed how best to open it up?

Any advise on how to prune this upright is appreciated. Or websites with beginner info, or well explained info. It's just that there is so much info out there I'm just getting a bit confused.

On a related note I have a dwarf laceleaf maple planted 1 year ago, should i wait for 2 years before pruning, it is growing branches to the ground that i have tied up, is that ok?