Painting - Wall Prep and Best Paint?

My interior walls are a stark white wall board material on my double-wide home. Each piece has a strip of some kind of material that covers over each joining seam. I would like to paint my walls and remove those strips and fill in between, but I am not sure what material to use. My house is not on a solid foundation and does move slightly when the washing machine is wondering, which causes some concern with my filler material cracking. Any suggestions on what would be the best material to use to fill those seams?

I also have heard that the best wait to prep the walls is to use a fine sand paper and use a water base latex paint. I am not sure if that would be best since the wallboard appears to have some kind of textured wall paper material on it. Your thoughts?

Thanks,
Alaskani

I would advise against removing the strips and filling them if your MH isn't set solid. You can tape and mud them as you would with a conventional house but if there is movement it will likley crack.

A light sanding won't hurt but a good cleaning is most important. MH drywall is a little different from conventional drywall. Instead of a paper face they have a vinyl covering [usually printed like wallpaper] I would not use a latex primer - shellac or oil base will adhere much better. If you have the primer tinted to the finish color you should be able to paint it with 2 coats [1 primer 1 finish paint]

I'm glad you've had the experience with the MHs marksr
It's a bit different than what I'm used to, and the procedures for them varies in some important ways
I wouldn't know how to answer these questions properly, and I am learning quite a bit about it from you
I hope you or the poster won't mind if I ask an additional question, or perhaps it's a clarifying question

In a situation like this it's best to paint over the metal strips? or leave them be?
You say you could mud over them, but I'm assuming there's more of a chance for (what I would call) settling cracks because it is a MH?
(I'm used to a high chance of settling cracks in my area, but that's an environmental issue)

Not a problem. In my case, what covers up the break between the 2 pieces of MH is just a thin strip, maybe about and inch, of what appears to be wood, and it is wrapped in the same matching material as the MH is covered in, similiar to the wallpaper. It is about 1/4 in. thick and is nailed in with very thin finishing nails.

Due to the movement of the house, it sounds like I will unfortunately have to leave them in a paint over them.

Thanks for your help with the paint that I need to use. Is there any particular type of cleaner that I need to use in order to prep the surface? How about taping, is there a certain tape I should use?

As far as I know the strips are always made of wood, usually covered with the same vinyl.
Any household cleaner will work [may not be needed if the walls are realitivily clean] Just be sure to rinse off any soap residue.

If you leave the strips you won't need tape but paper tape does hold out cracks better than the sticky mesh tape does.