The key, I think, is to look at posts on your own instance url as much as possible. Like, I subscribed to [email protected] which is from where I'm seeing your post now, but I'm viewing it while I'm "on" my own instance, that way I'm logged in, and thus able to comment.
I think a question then is how to carry an exact post back to your own instance. I just went out and randomly found: https://latte.isnot.coffee/post/6492
To convert that to a post on my own instance I copy and pasted that url into my search bar back at Lemmy.pro and got:
Then I clicked on the article title there "Favorite Brewing Method" et voila, got that post viewable on my own instance, but without the existing 19 comments showing up:
... and then I myself got stuck and couldn't ever get the comments on the post to load on my own instance, don't know why... ha.... Anyone know how to do that better?