I am a TEFL newbie considering working in Thailand with some questions??

Hey, so let me start by telling you a bit about me which will hopefully make answering my question easier. I am 20 years old and live in England. I am currently in my third and final year of an English and Creative Writing degree. I would like to teach abroad after uni and have been researching locations for ages and Thailand seems perfect. I have not decided yet whether I'd consider this to be a career or just something I'll do for a few years but hopefully after my first teaching job, I'll know. Let me just give the time scale of my plan. I leave university in June and I'll immediately start looking for a full-time job, not a graduate career but just something that will help me be able to fund going abroad etc. Here are my questions:

1. I have no TEFL qualification but was planning on doing the CELTA course. Now I have read that in Thailand you don't really need the CELTA qualification and can get away with another TEFL course. The reason why I'm not going away and immediately doing the CELTA is due to the price, it is more expensive than the other TEFL courses so I want to know which course I should take SPECIFICALLY for Thailand. Does it generally matter? Do you get paid more for having the CELTA in Thailand?

2. I have no savings at all, how much should I save up before going to Thailand? I understand that Thailand doesn't pay as much as other countries do so obviously I would want to have a bit of my own money too. Pref in either £ or $.

3. I've also read that the best way to find a job is to just go out there and pound the pavements. I really hoped that I would be able to set something up without going there for a few reasons. First of all, does that mean going to Thailand for a couple of weeks, setting up a job, going back home, getting a visa etc and then going back to start the job? Or does that mean literally packing everything up, moving there, finding a job and then staying? If the latter is the case how would you get a visa etc?

I'm really sorry about the long questions but I'm really nervous about going out to a country I've never visited, alone and having to be extremely independent, find a place to stay and a job. I understand that it's part of the experience but I would be more comfortable if I knew where I was staying and had a job secured.