Ctrl-lpj is ingrained in my fingers.

Ctrl-l to clear the screen, Ctrl-p to select previous command, Ctrl-j to enter it again. I don't even use Enter key when in terminal anymore.

When you want to pause entering a command for a moment do Ctrl-a to go to the start of the line, and type # to comment out. Then Ctrl-j. You can return to that later with Ctrl-p, then Ctrl-a again and Ctrl-d to remove that comment.

To edit complex commands you might want to use Alt-e to enter $EDITOR.