What part of N. Alabama? Northeast?
Going to a callmaker and getting help and choosing is a great start. A slate is probably the pot that most would recommend, but some make some easy to use glass and aluminum as well. I don't know what callmakers are close to you, but you should consider them.
Lonnie Mabry is near Canton, GA and makes calls in a shop behind his house. But he does not take orders by phone, mail, email, or internet, it is walk-in business only. He would be roughly one hour from Rome, GA. He sells high quality custom calls as cheap as any you'll find, and better prices than most off the shelf. In other words, depending on where you are in Bammer, his calls are likely worth the time and the gas. His boxes are $50 and his pots are $25, he could hep you choose, and show you a little about how to run them. You could buy his calls and use them for a lifetime. He makes a sanded, heavy duty glass pot (not bronzed glass) that is the easiest to maintain and use glass call I've ever seen.
Another option is to talk to makers here on the phone and have them help you choose them. Gary Taylor of Stone Road in Ga, Pappy in MO, Joe Slayton of Motherlode in CA, M. Yingling in PA, and others that escape my recollection are all on this forum and make good calls at good prices.
Russell Beard of Beardhunter Calls Buford, GA makes very reasonably priced pot calls and boxcalls and sells over the phone and net and ships. I have people trying to take away some calls I've acquired from him. He is a very pleasant fellow as well.
http://www.beardhunter.com/The boys at Cane Creek Calls make some very reasonably priced items as well.
As far as box calls, I'd guess that purpleheart/cedar, walnut/poplar, walnut/walnut, walnut/mohag, purpleheart/poplar, mohag/mohag, walnut/bbutternut, purpleheart/sassafrass would all be worthy of consideration.
