Accordian transparency and first selected...

Accordian transparency and first selected...

Hi coming from Mootools and beeing pretty new to JS,
I'd tried to implement JQ on a site. That works nice but I've two or three minor questions.

This is my code

     $(document).ready(function() {
         $('div.accordion> div').hide(); 
             $('div.accordion> h3').click(function() {
            var $nextDiv = $(this).next();
            var $visibleSiblings = $nextDiv.siblings('div:visible');
           if ($visibleSiblings.length ) {
              $visibleSiblings.slideUp('normal', function() {
                $nextDiv.slideToggle('slow');            
            });
            } else {
              $nextDiv.slideToggle('slow');
          }
          });
        });


My questions:

1st: Is there a way to add to this code/behavior a smooth 'fade' on UP and DOWN of the text? I tried to experiment with opacity but didn't get it.

2nd: At the moment I use two different JSs because in some HTML pages I need the first node 'opened' in some not. Is there an easy way to add to the code above an extra 'selector' similar to

$('div.accordion div:not(:first)').hide();
but within one file?


Last: Using this 'not hide' does not activate the first node via css - any idea how to do this? - I'm sure this cool peace of SW is able to...

Sorry I'm a bit under pressure and not familiar with JS/JQ.

cheers
E.