Ok, so I've made 2 cakes with fondant so far....BOTH of them had creases and I just spent a good hour watching online videos of people just draping on the fondant, smoothing it out and they're done! What am I doing wrong that I can't seem to make it completely smooth all the way around? I'm really hoping to make a few more fondant cakes in the very near future, and it would be awesome if I could figure this out.....maybe it really is just that easy and I was just too impatient to get it all smooth....

Also, before you put the fondant on, everyone says to use buttercream....why? Can you just use any frosting you have available, or does buttercream do something that the other frostings can't?

While I'm at it....I'm looking to make a fondant horse. I watched a few videos about how to make figures with fondant as well, but if there's any advice that can be shared, I would really appreciate that as well!

This is how I get the fondant smooth:

Put the cake on a cake board cut to the size of the cake itself. Cover with buttercream, not at thick as you would normally do but a bit thicker than a crumb coat. Chill until firm and buttercream has crusted. Roll fondant. Take cake out of fridge and set it on something smaller in diameter than the cake itself, maybe a smaller upside-down cake pan. Drape the fondant over the cake and open out any pleats that form. Trim any large excess with kitchen shears. Smooth the cake, starting with the top and going down the sides. When it's smooth enough, trim the excess fondant off just below the cake board. Let the fondant firm up a bit, then transfer the cake to a larger, decorated board (the one cut to the size of the cake will still be on there too).

As far as using buttercream, what other frostings were you talking about? Some people use ganache.

That will help a lot, thank you! Maybe the difference is having the cake elevated for the fondant to hang, it's probably easier to work with that way and I didn't even think about doing that. (I just had it sitting on the counter)

And as far as other frostings, I mean, can you just use a store bought vanilla or cream cheese frosting, just as long as it's not a darker color so that it would show through the fondant?