Short answers, pulled from the story.
The first session of the United Nations General Assembly was convened on the 10th of January 1946 at the Methodist Central Hall in London, with representatives of 51 founding nations present.
The United Nations General Assembly has 193 member states, all of whom hold equal representation. The Holy See and Palestine participate as observer states, and the European Union has held observer status since 1974.
Most United Nations General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding on member states. The main exception is budgetary decisions, which do bind members. The Assembly can refer matters to the Security Council, which has authority to issue binding resolutions.
The Uniting for Peace resolution, adopted on the 3rd of November 1950 as Resolution 377(V), allows the General Assembly to consider and make recommendations on threats to international peace when the Security Council is blocked from acting by a permanent member's veto. Under this power, the Assembly must convene within 24 hours of a request, with members notified at least twelve hours before the session opens.
The General Assembly approves the United Nations budget and sets each member state's assessed contribution. Contributions are calculated based on each country's relative share of total gross national product, adjusted for factors including per capita income. Members are assessed separately for international tribunals and peacekeeping operations under a modified version of the same scale.
In a report titled "In Larger Freedom" presented on the 21st of March 2005, Secretary-General Kofi Annan criticized the Assembly for passing watered-down consensus resolutions and pursuing too broad an agenda. He recommended streamlining the agenda and committee structure, strengthening the president's authority, expanding the role of civil society, and creating a mechanism to review committee decisions. The 2005 World Summit did not adopt these proposals.