We have a wedge-shaped fan pad for her computer, as well (bought it for mine, which is a MUCH-higher-horsepower model than anything else as of purchase date last year - started using it with her old laptop after the first crash to black screen last year and got myself another fan base). Puts the keyboard at a better angle, as well - it feels better than with the laptop flat on the table for me, and apparently for her too, so I had to get myself another for my computer. Besides, now she has the silver fan pad to go with her (new) silver-framed laptop, and I have a black one to go with mine. With blue LED fans, which I have to wonder... why? You have the computer on top of the pad, so you don't see the fans. But it didn't change the price, either.
Yeah, if literally all you need the computer for is pretty basic Web crawling, word processing, etc., the $400 base models will generally do those just fine, so why spend the extra money? We needed decidedly more capability for her, and thought we did pretty well coming in under (JUST under) $1K. She'll get enough ease-of-use out of the backlit keyboard alone to justify a reasonable chunk of the cost - if I never get a non-backlit keyboard again, that'll be just fine with both of us.