Using Apple Mail With Gmail - Important Label (folder)

I have had to move from being a longtime Comcast user to using Gmail. I have always used Apple Mail on my Macbook Pro and never encountered any issues when Mail is used with the Comcast email service. I cannot say that the migration was without a fair amount of pain and now down to my "last three issues"...

  1. How do you tag/untag messages as being "Important" where Gmail presents these specifically tagged messages in the Important Label (folder)? What is the best way to use "Important" within the Mail application (I did some investigation and could not find a way to remove/delete or disable the Gmail feature i.e. Important.
  2. When moving messages to labels/folders use the "Move" control in the toolbar of an open message window. The message persists as "open" after moving and a separate action is required to close/dismiss the message window. Is there a setting that would close the message window after moving it to another label (folder)? Seems to me this is how Outlook works (I could be wrong).
  3. When moving a message the Move control in the toolbar does not populate an MRU list of labels (folders). I can navigate the entire directory tree but thought this list was populated with the MRU items when used with Comcast email service.
Using Apple Mail With Gmail - Important Label (folder)
 
 
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