well...i've watched the anime version and i'm glad to say i was very drawn in but the ending left me unsatisfied...so could anyone tell me where the manga starts where the anime left off or where the anime started to stray from the manga? thanks

The anime encompasses the first nine volumes of the manga. You won't have missed anything major (at least nothing I can remember) if you start reading at volume ten.

How about the live action drama, does it follow the manga pretty closely?

"[English] not only borrows words from other languages; it has on occasion chased other languages down dark alley-ways, clubbed them unconscious and rifled their pockets for new vocabulary."
-James Nicoll, can.general, March 21, 1992