How do you query this field? (simple questions)

[mPeror]

Say I have those three tables for a basic forum:
Thread:
- id [PK]
(and a few other columns)

user_thread:
- id [PK]
- thread_id [FK1]
- user_id [Fk2]

User:
- id [PK]
- name
(and a few other columns)

My questions here are basically:

1) When I'm working with the "Thread" table in a query, what's the best way to fetch user name associated with that "Thread"? or should that be in a different query?

2) Am I doing the relations correctly? to be honest, I don't know when I should have an intermediate table between related tables, I just guessed that.


Your help is much appreciated