I definitely do feel a pull toward people and places that are far from my own life.
If writers stuck to firsthand experience, novels would be pretty limited.
Endings are never neat, because when life goes on, there is no end. You may want to speculate about what the characters get up to afterwards, but I feel it would be presumptuous of me to dictate that.
I don't think I could write about someone I didn't feel some sympathy for.
I don't use real people for inspiration.
Because I work quite slowly, I have to keep myself interested over a long research and writing period. So I can't see myself writing about modern middle-class Londoners anytime soon.