Well, thanks to Cybermonk and Luxxeon over in the modelling forum, I just learned that I can assign keyboard shortcuts to each subelement in edit mode.  So instead of clicking on the vertex, edges, or faces icons, or using the CTRL+TAB, then picking an element from the menu, you can just toggle between them using keyboard shortcuts!  I didn't know this was an option before, and literally, it has increased the speed and productivity of my workflow in Blender, beyond words!  Just this one tip has potentially saved me hundreds of clicks per modelling session.  I'm totally excited by that.  My modelling workflow is much closer now to what I was used to in 3dsmax.  Thank you again, guys!

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Tools :  3dsmax 2015, Daz Studio 4.6, PoserPro 2012, Blender v2.74

System: Pentium QuadCore i7, under Win 8, GeForce GTX 780 / 2GB GPU.