Hey welcome to the club, if you look aronud you'll probably find what you need!
Was spooky reading your post as i went from a L reg mk3 golf (1.4) to an SRi!
compared to the golf its so much nicer inside with air con, comfy seats, leather steering wheel, power steering, abs etc, so thats a plus! performance is different to they're 98bhp standard, and with afew typical mods you can gain alot of performance, the 1.6 engine is so underrated, its bulletproof and as long as you look after it it will last forever, it was also designed with economy and an easy ride in mind so afew well planned mods will release quite a lot of hidden horsepower.
Ultimatley I sold mine as however much money i spent on it it would never be a GTi, so instead i bought a GTi and found that too expensive!
Now own a 100nx which is the same engine as the SRi and can live comfortably again theres a huge difference in petrol costs alone!
Anyway, hope that rambling helped! in terms of buying an almera common problems when looking are rust around the rear wheel arches in particular, a leaking power steering fluid hose (behind the passenger's side headlight) and check the heating inside works on all 4 settings not just 1 and 4. The latter two are easy fixes and obviously the rust depends on the individual car.