As you start looking at lenses keep in mind, you get what you pay for.
There are some inexpensive telephoto and zoom-telephoto lenses out there but
as the price goes done so does the quality of the glass and the max
aperture.  Of course photography is a subjective thing and only you know
what level of quality you expect from you photographs and how much money you
are willing to spend to achieve that quality.

I can see by the way you describe the lens you received with your camera
that you are focusing on the focal length of the lens and not paying
attention to the other lens specifications.  For example I have a "300mm f/4
L IS USM"  The additional information to the right of 300mm is important in
describing the lens and its capabilities.  if/4, (the max aperture of the
lens) is one of the more important specs.  typically, as this number gets
smaller the price tag goes up exponentially as well as the physical size of
the lens.

"L" is Canon's series of low-dispersion glass lenses whisc produce sharper
images than the same lenses without the low-dispersion glass.  It makes a
noticable difference.

"IS" means the lens has servo image stabilization.  This allows you to hand
hold the lens and slower shutter speeds without having to worry about camera
shake effecting the quality of your photos.  Without "IS" you are limited
the the "1/focal length" rule when hand holding.

"USM" describes the auto-focus drive on this lens,  typically, quiter and
faster is what you want here.

My point in all this is there is more to take into account when looking at
lenses than just focal length and you will want to consider this before you
go out and get your self that 1000mm f/11.  You might get a days amusment
out of it before you realize it dosen't produce the photos you would like it
to.  You would better better off with your 200mm and using your feet to get
closer.

About RAW,

When you shoot in JPG the RAW data captured by the image sensor in your
camera get run through a pre-programmed algorithm in you camera as it get
converted to a JPG file.  This like white balance and exposure are then set
in stone and you cannot adjust it after the fact;  for many this is
perfectly okay. The benefit of JPG is the images are compressed and you can
fit many more on your card than you could RAW files.

RAW allows you to tweak the white balance, exposure and other parameters, in
fact you can recover to some extent details lost in over exposed images when
using RAW.  In short RAW gives you more control over your image rather than
depending on an algorithm to make those decisions for you. The down side is
larger files and extra steps in the post production workflow.  In my
opinion, neither of these two are much of a big deal,  memory is getting
cheaper all the time and after you get use to it the RAW processing takes
only minutes per image.

I shoot strictly RAW.

Patrick Ziegler
www.imagequest.ifp3.com

[snip]

The question is often asked, "why shoot raw?"

With modern tools, a better question is often "why shoot JPEG?"

With modern tools, for a photographer who expects to do some post-
processing, shooting raw can be easier than shooting JPEG. (Guess what
I shoot with my Pentaxes!)

--
Barry Pearson
http://www.barrypearson.co.uk/photography/

There are, of course, several advantages and disadvantages. There are
several threads in here to the effect of 'why raw?'. You may want to check
them out.

Briefly, raw is more like a negative. In order to print it, for example,
you need to do some processing. It may be nothing more than a
straightforward default conversion, or you may adjust exposure, contrast,
white balance, etc. but you have to do something as most print programs
will not accept raw files - for good reason: every manufacturer has their
own format.

jpeg is a standard. You don't need to do additional processing to get a
printable image - and they are significantly smaller (usually). On the
other hand, the amount of processing you CAN do is somewhat more limited
(one factor being that jpeg is most often 8 bits per channel whereas most
raw formats produce 12 bits per channel, so there is more to work with in
a raw).

I shoot mostly raw with my Kodak P850. I reserve shooting jpeg for
occassions where time is critical - saving raw files on my non-dslr takes
a fair amount of time.

    Lens is one of the most important parts of photography (gear), so I would
suggest to do more research on the whole lens series before deciding what
camera you going to invest in.

- Camera BODY can be upgraded, but lens you will be stuck with it/them

- When you start investing on hi-end (top_of_the_line) lens, you will find
out that lens is much more expensive that camera body.

    And just like most others, you usually get what you pay for.  Or if you
pay for cheap lens (example $400 vs $5000) then you shouldn't expect much
from it (to me it isn't worth the trouble)

    There is some advantage and disadvantage, or depending on your photography
and retouching skill, your photography style, and your technique etc..

RAW is a least processing format (many people read and believe RAW is
unprocessed format but this ain't true), so you have extra chance to recover
some under/overexposed.

    - RAW converters are not born equally so one may do better/worse or
    different than other.  So if you decide to go for RAW then pick one
    suites your style

    - RAW has limited of some adjustments, so if you don't do detail work then
    RAW could be the right tool for you.  And because it's limited of tools
    so you may be able to master in months.

    I do use RAW but not my bread and butter, and to me *if* something needs
    to be repaired (exposure issue) then may not worth my time.

JPEG, as you know what JPEG is, or with retouching skill (may need years of
experience) then JPEG pretty much can do what RAW can and lot more than what
RAW can.  Or what program like Photoshop it has 300-400% more commands than
most RAW converter, but will require ot of learning.

    No, JPEG can't undo what already processed, but with skill you may even be
able to undo the overexposed already been processed (and much easier if some
data still available, else you may need more trick).

    And I work mostly with JPEG.

There ae a number of 500mm mirror lenses for about $100 and i saw a
used 100-500mm f5.6-8.0 Phoenix zoom lens to fit Pentax K mount lens
on ebay very cheap.

Keep in mind that you can effectively increase the zoom by
using "digital zoom", which is simply cropping the photo.
Many cameras have this function built in, but you get more
control by doing it in an image editing program.