Congrats!
Very 8) ... at least soon to be much 8) 8) 8) and like your buddy said, I'll bet you'll be blown away with the improved performance...especially if you've gone a while w/o it. Is that an LOM as Mustangsix mentioned above...aren't they vacuum advance only? (maybe you meant vacuum not 'mechanical'). If so, it might be worthwhile to swap in a new SCV while you're at it (if you are running a stock LOM) to be sure you're getting a good strong signal for advance. They can usually be changed out w/o even removing the carb...unless you put a new one on recently. Just a maintenance suggestion cause the SCV can wear out or fail, or you could just test the signal at the distributor port on the carb to make sure it's working okay, but it sounds like you nearly got it whipped.
