Well I am also one of those people that choose not to root but have tinkered with phones that have been. I think anybody who has rooted can tell you that since you said you're over- impressed with the phones can-do's you may as well just go with the out of the box experience.
Rooting can :
- install custom roms and operating systems to improve functions and features but you'll have to manually keep up with all the pieces of your root including updates (no more over the air)
-Can free yourself from the binds of your carrier but can void warranty if something goes wrong and you can't get it back to original
-Can install different versions of Android for specific features but device specs with certain versions can cause undesirable affects
-Have more control over your phone than ever but could end up spending too much time messing with your phone/computer than it might be worth
-Can overclock your device to increase speed and performance but run the risk of overheating your phone and increasing battery consumption
Bricking the phone is probably the worst case in which your phone becomes inoperable.
I'm sure there are more pros and cons but I haven't researched any farther than these details as I find the cons outweigh the pros for me. This phone is already a Ferrari so i dont have any desire to dig into the fuel management system and other computer features
If you are still interested go to the rooting/hacking section here at AC, you'll find all the info you need to know. Hope this helped some