RE: Money Order
You can. If you buy one of those prepaid mastercard / visa debit things, they have a normal number you can use for any transaction. So even if you dont use paypal, you have some protection. Ideally you can convince your parents about PayPal. Thing is, if you attach a credit card to the PayPal account, ONLY PayPal has that info, you're not giving it out to random people and businesses. It's incredibly safe and secure.