Interest begins accruing right away, but repayment of the interest is not required until the student leaves school (graduation or other reasons), after a grace period.
Apply to Duquesne, you might still be able to get merit aid.
Merit, yes. Need based, probably not, unless there is some exceptional circumstance, like a family with 20 kids! The net price calculators are predicting no aid for a one child family at $230,000.
@TheGreyKing well…half of those 20 kids would need to be enrolled in college for a family of $600,000 income to get any federally funded grant aid 
@TexasDA: have you talked to your mom?
What I would suggest you do is make a spreadsheet with the schools you’ve applied to, note once admissions decisions come in. Have a column for cost of attendance, any merit scholarship money, the $5500 loan you can take out each year, and then the net cost per year your parents will need to help you with. I would also include the rankings of the various schools. A higher ranked college would be worth more money out of pocket to many parents, a slightly lower ranked school giving ample merit aide may be a contender. I think it will show a lot of maturity on your part if you have your options and the numbers ready to go.
@TexasDA Did you talk to her?
Good heavens…this thread is 9 pages long and it doesn’t appear that the OP has gotten an answer from the parents.
OP hasn’t posted since 03/05, but has checked in as recently as yesterday to apparently continue reading the replies here.
MODERATOR’S NOTE:
When OP gets an update from his/her parents, I will reopen the thread. Until such time, as it appears s/he is not planning on answering questions posed, I am closing this thread as there is nothing else for anyone other than the OP to add.