I am not much further ahead of you, but you will need to use an MEP template. You can import your .dwt and .dwg into the Autodesk .dwt and it will import your styles, but it doesn't work to bring all of their catalogs into your templates.
As for layer names, you might be better off excepting the AutoCAD defaults. You can edit layer colors and lineweight, but you will have to modify the layer key style and edit each item one by one. However, once it is edited, it is saved for all projects (or until the next version comes out).