Electric choke question

Hey guys, thanks for all your help so far (well except for the un-answered thread about the brake bleeder screws lol)!

I have a couple of questions about the electric choke. I did some searching on here and didn't find much in regards to this so I hope this isn't newbie repeat questions!

On my 340 I have an Edelbrock carb (I believe it is a 1406) with an electric choke. I am still sorting out tons of issues with it but one of the probs I have is a rough low idle upon start up. Unfortunately I haven't even been able to warm it up properly as the tires have dry rot and need to be replaced before I will even take it out of my driveway!

I am not very familiar with electric chokes (all my cars are EFI and my bikes have all been manual choke)....first of all, how do I engage it? Is it a normally closed and the wire leads/relay open it when it is warm? Or is it normally open and the wires/relay close it when it is cold? The reason I ask is I was poking around with it and I disconnected the power lead and didn't hear any click or anything. This lead me to think that maybe I wasn't getting power (oh yeah I fogrgot to mention I did this in the run position but without the motor running). I checked the leads and I am getting about 8.9v. The red wire does not go directly to power but rather to the white ceramic thing (name has jumped out of my mind!).

If anyone can give me some electric choke for dummies info I would appreciate it.

If this has been discussed then a point in the direction of the other thread would be appreciated as well!!

Thanks again,
Dennis