Sarah is correct -- at least from what I've experienced thus far.
Its first thing in the morning for me, so I apologize if I'm not clear in what I'm about to describe.
From my experiences, whether you are in the etheric, astral or higher, the place you end up tends to coincide with your level of awareness/consciousness at the time. I don't like the labels astral, etheric, etc but everyone uses them so I default to them as well. When I OBE, I experience a body because my awareness level believes it needs one. I also tend not to be as 'crisp' as I am when I'm in the astral. I'm assuming -- and its just an assumption on my part at present -- that because my awareness is low, the plane/level in which I find myself (the etheric) is also kind of pale in color and the surroundings are very similar to my physical surroundings. Gravity is present, but in mild form, so walking is somewhat like walking on the moon -- you do a bouncy-step thing. Again, I think that I perceive similar surroundings, no real color, and a vague sense of gravity, yet can walk through walls, fly etc, because my awareness is high enough to know I'm not in a physical body at the moment, but its not aware enough to realize that these things don't really exist for me outside of the physical, so I am somewhat between the astral and physical. Again, I'm not sure this is making sense or not, so bear with me.
When my awareness is higher, I skip the etheric altogether and go straight to the astral. Here I perceive vibrant colors (those in physical reality pale in comparison), I do not perceive any gravity per se, although I can still 'walk normal' there as opposed to the bouncy feeling I get in the etheric. The other key difference is I never perceive a body while I'm there. Even within the astral realm, I will have varying degrees of awareness/consciousness with noticable differences.
I guess you could somewhat liken consciousness/awareness to degrees of temperature. At what point does a temperature go from warm to hot? Or from cool to warm? What's the specific degree these things happen? There is no set answer because the temperatures blend from one to another seemlessly, although there are changes that one perceives with each increase/decrease in degree. Consciousness I think can be like that. The etheric, astral and all other planes are a reflection of the level of awareness we are able to attain. But they are not delineated with a cut and dry line, they tend to blend one in to the other.
This analogy fails in that it is only a 2 dimensional example. Consciousness is far beyond 2D. So while you can go up and down in only one direction at a time, consciousness can go 360 degrees. But its the only thing I can think of at the moment. To put this example back in to phasing, I can be in the astral and perceive dream elements, or overlays as Frank would call them. This is because my awareness is high, but my focus is off.
Duh, that's the other thing that is critical and I forgot to mention. Awareness is a big part of it, but I think focus plays and extremely important roll as well. You can be aware enough to be in the astral, but if your focus (focus being equal to thoughts) is scattered, you begin perceiving dreams and other random events occuring as well. So your friend's comment about lucid dreaming being AP is right in the sense that all of this is simply varying degrees of consciousness and focus.
And as for Sarah's comments regarding Frank, I completely agree. Of all of the people on this forum, I found his posts resonated most with my own experiences. He was more scientific and organized in his descriptions/practices than me, but the experiences he describes are very similar to what I have also experienced. So I would highly recommend reading his posts and seeing if anything resonates with you.
And I also agree with the comment about the etheric/OBE. I was phasing before I knew what it was and before I ever OBE'd. I much prefer the astral. It isn't that one is better or worse than the other, but like Sarah said, I don't see what the big deal is.
Lastly, what I'm writing now are simply my thoughts at present based on what I've experienced thus far. These are always evolving the more I experience, so don't take what I say as 'right or wrong'. I'm merely presenting what I perceive to be a possible explaination/description of the various planes of consciousness. I could just as easily be totally wrong about all of it!
EDIT: Definately not awake yet this morning. Sorry for the afterthought, but I forgot to mention that the feelings linked to thoughts on which you focus (or lack thereof) play a big part in your perceptions. And this could be related to what eastern philosophies refer to as vibration, but there are definately different 'places' that resonate with different types of feelings.
At present, I think there is a 3-prongued way through which we perceive/interact in the astral: consciousness/awareness level, thoughts/focus and feelings. I think your ability to stablize the experience and minimize the amount of dream components is directly proportional to your ability to focus exclusively on specific things/people. I think your ability to perceive the experience in as pure and unaltered a way as possible is related to your level of awareness/consciousness at the time. The place/level you end up in is driven by the thoughts/feelings you have at the time. And feelings are also many-layered things. Its not just about 'angry' or 'lust' or 'fear' that define a place or feel. We all feel many things simultaneously and in different degrees. I've met some people while out that just had what I would describe as a very heavy, dirty feel to them. I found that being too close to them actually made me nauseaus. I had to move away from them in order to feel better. So where you go and who you meet are also influenced by the feelings you have as well. Again, sorry for the incomplete post originally and also for the lengthy post this has turned in to. Hopefully something here helps!
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