Allowing my living niece into my research

First of all, AMAZING site and thank you so much for helping me uncover my family history. When my father and grandfather’s were alive I didn’t much care about their talking about their elders, but now as I am pushing 50 I have started to understand what they were going for..

I was SOOO pleased to hang out with my 17 year old niece today and find out at her age she found this history as fascinating as I do now..I sent her to the ap and the website, but she can’t seem to “find” me..She gave me her 7 digit code and I figured I could just add her to the tree so she could have access to all the history (going back to the 1500s) on parts of the family, but I can’t seem to add her..

Any hints or clues or guidance on how I can do this?

She will not be able to "find" you. Living records are in "private space" in Family Search. You won't be able to see her and she won't be able to see you. However, once you each bridge to a common deceased ancestor, you will be able to see each other's efforts to correct information and attach sources.

FamilySearch is 1 tree that we are all part of. All she needs to access the history you see is to link into a common ancestral line you share with her.

Your niece should enter living ancestors (parents, grandparents, etc) who will show in her private space. No details are needed - she can just enter their name as a place-holder. Then she should search for the deceased ancestors. The living records are the bridge to the deceased records.

For example: my parents are both living but my grandparents are all deceased. I entered my parents in FamilySearch and then linked my deceased grandparents to them by searching for them in FamilySearch. My parent's records in my private space are the bridge to my deceased ancestors. My parents could have provided my grandparents' record numbers from their login in FamilySearch, but they were easy enough for me to find.

In FamilySearch, for privacy purposes, much/most of the information about living persons is kept in private space. If I look at the Person page for one of my living relatives, I see this banner:

Living and confidential people are managed in a private space. Only you will be able to see and modify this person. However, anyone could potentially see the photos, documents, and stories that are attached to this person.

Generally, the simplest solution is for each of the researchers (you and your niece) separately enter information about all living persons (into private space). Effectively, each researcher will see their own private version of each living person. Then, each researcher will need to link those private-space living persons to deceased ancestors/relatives. The deceased ancestors/relatives will be outside private space, so there will be only one version of each deceased ancestors/relatives. Any changes made to records of deceased persons will be visible to all. (Well, there could be duplicate records for deceased persons, but those can be combined.)

Did that explanation make sense?

(Just to make sure expectations are consistent, this is mostly a user-to-user discussion forum. FamilySearch has official support/help mechanisms in the app and website.)