Is it possible to do the opposite? Can I connect from a lemmy instance to follow a couple of people on mastodon?

Ah got it thanks. Then does the !community I’m posting to just act as a tag to stay organized and help others find the post? Or is it used in the federation of the post to other servers?

For example, from my account on beehaw.org I post to !lemmy_support@lemmy.ml. This writes to beehaw.org’s database and lets lemmy.ml know about the new post (lemmy.ml saves a copy). Do other instances who have a user subscribed to !lemmy_support@lemmy.ml reach out to lemmy.ml to get a list of posts under that community? Or do other instances reach out to beehaw.org to see if there are any posts to !lemmy_support@lemmy.ml?

I guess I’m mostly just confused on how !communities are used in the federation process.