Animating with flash

Flashers:
Okay so most of us know how to make a ball move from one side of the screen to the other whether it is by using the timeline or with AS.

What I want to learn is how to animate little cartoons or flying paper or something crazy more then just average movement on a button or changing lighting.

So my question is:
Are flash animators using the timeline when doing crazy animations?

Or are they creating instances (outside of flash, in PS or ILLus) of the animation then placing them on individual frames?

Or making them inside of the flash development and placing them on individual frames?

I want to attempt some goods but no luck finding any good resources and dont know the best methods.

Any resources please hit me with them I will eat them all up. :slight_smile:

Thanks MT