17 Sham Having Trouble Leveling

[Ballaorf]

I'm nearly 18, but I've been stuck at 17 for a while and I'm looking for a little guidance on what I should be doing. Some more background:
- I'm not really twinked out. Someone was kind enough to gift me some gear and a little plat, but it's far from optimal and I haven't been able to find any affordable gear for sale yet (I only have around 650p in the bank): I still have cloth sleeves, a couple of pieces of banded, two raw hide bracers, and the Tribunal Symbol necklace.
- I guess because of this gear, I'm having a lot of trouble soloing. I can only take one blue before I need to heal and med up for 5+ minutes - and the blues take me down to 30-40% HP.
- I've consulted a few leveling guides I've found, but I can't solo most of the spots it recommends (I did make a full level soloing the sisters bandit camp, but then died three times to roaming brownies, so I'm scared away from lfay). I've tried finding groups in Oasis, Unrest, and Highpass; I got an Orc Highway group in Oasis once, but otherwise have come up empty-handed every time I've looked.

I have a group of friends to play with, but my schedule rarely aligns with theirs, so they are starting to outlevel me quite a bit.

Am I doing something wrong? Are there better zones I can find groups in? It doesn't seem like soloing is going to work for me at this point.