Very very doubtful that a ham radio could pick up signals from great distances. The Inverse Square Law really takes a toll over thousands of light years.
Indeed. I’ve read that our signals would be too faint to detect after only 100 ly.
If I was running an interstellar civilization, I’d communicate with probes at each star’s gravitational lens focus. Yes, one could use lasers, but even those spread out and lose power density at long enough distances.