Welcome to Cantr
1) There is always someone logged in somewhere, since we have players from all over the world, and many of us log in several or many times a day. There's lots of reasons why things might seem unusually quiet where your char or chars are:
-it could be that the players behind the other chars can't play as much as usual right now, due to holiday travel, summer school, kids being home and needing watching, etc., etc.
-it could be that players are currently devoting alot of time to other of their chars right now, which would possibly cause them to spend less time on the chars you are seeing in your town or towns.
-it may just be that your town is naturally more quiet than you would imagine it would be or would like it to be. As you start to fit in to your town more, you'll have more to do and talk about. This can take a bit of time, but starting conversations and asking questions in character (IC), will help get that started.
-Once your chars find their place, so to speak, you likely won't have any trouble with things feeling too quiet.
2) Learning how to get something, how to make something, how to find something, how to successfully trade or work (or steal

) are all things you want to find out in the game with your chars. If your char asks how to make a trowel, someone will likely either tell you how to do it, or will offer you one that they have in return for your work or as a trade.
-Do remember though that when one of your chars learns something, your other chars still don't know until they also learn it themselves.
3) Learning about the laws and social customs of each town is an important part of your chars becoming socialized, or not

. Now that the char you mentioned has made a mistake in his or her town, he or she will likely have a better understanding of how that town works and how to relate to his or her neighbors in the future.