Like mentioned you can lay a hanging strop on a flat surface to "imitate" a paddle strop and as your stropping improves you can use it hanging.

If you get a paddle, when you feel you want to move on to/back to a hanging strop you can use the paddle for travelling, there's nothing to loose, only win

Is your problem with the MWF that it spins around in the container? If so it's easy to solve, just leave some water/lather in the containernand it will stick to it within a couple uses.

Whatever you do don't try to melt it, it will melt the lanolin and ruin the soap. This is also why you should use luke warm water with MWF, lanolin melts at about 38C/100F.