I have brought wool from in-store, the double knit. it isnt bad for the money at all.
There is also a shop around the sunderland area called kemps wool shop, they have some FAB wools in the sale section, and have usually aqround 25 pages of sale wools. They also have patterns in the sale.
Personally, I havent brought a pattern yet, what with my magazine subscritption, and the endless free patterns on the net. I also trade patterns with several pensionser I know.
I got a lovely MASSIVE stash of wool off ebay for £10 plus postage, over 3kg of mixed yarns, different textures etc. It was a great buy of someone elses odds and ends that will be really usefull to me.
But I do agree most shops seem very expensive for wool these days
Lidl have some cheap aran and DK at the moment in my local one anyway, not sure if they all do.