Ford: 1988 ford broncon, 1988 ford bronco, ford bronco

Question
i recently bought a 1988 ford bronco with 90k origial miles. it has a 351 engine(5.8 fi mfi v8) being an older female- i donot know much about mechanics! it is a beautiful vehicle and i love it, but am concerned with a couple of problems that i have gotten very mixed messages about.  1.) on starting, it starts,but the idle will drop and the engine will dies. on restarting, if i keep my foot on the accelorator at an exact pressure for 30 seconds, it will "catch" and stay running.  2.) there is a "whistling" noise coming from the carberation system  when accelerating- not when idling.  i am on a small fixed income and donot want to be taken advantage of. where do you think i should start with this?  also, will a slight exhaust leak have a negative impact on the horsepower in this vehicle.  thank you in advance for your time- it is wonderful that you  volunteer your time.  

Answer
debbie replace  the ECT sensor the one for the computer.  i had one 2 weeks ago and it did the same thing .the whistling noise is  probably a vac leak i would ck this first before i replace the sensor listed above the vac leak may take care of the problem.with the vehicle running listen and follow the noise this will lead you to the leak do this first then let me know now also in front or on your air cleaner you will see a vacumm diagram you could follow this as a map. let me know.