I was also using the freeware version and I refuse to buy a plugin for a free program. That is just plain wrong in my book and really should not be allowed. However I guess enough ppl are buying into it.
Anyway I am registered at the site, it didn't cost anything to do that. I'm not sure what the point of it is, except you can get notification of updates. I think the author thinks he's created the next big thing or something, not just an add-on. I found the help at the site to be worthless. Perhaps its changed now as I have not been back in awhile.
But as I mentioned before, I feel the interface isn't very intuitive. I have seen post after post about people having difficulty with this plugin, yet the author doesn't care to fix it.
Maybe if it was easier to use, even more people would purchase it.