Snipper gives some valid thoughts, nice post. There are a lot of variables is your equation, but the loudest one I hear is money. If that is correct, you are going to have a hard time getting the money to attend a pilot mill or a pilot school because that is by far the most expensive route. But for those wanting to get going on a professional pilot career without worrying about check-the-box or fallback academics, large pilot schools really are the way to go because other ways take too long to get the flight numbers you need. So my advice would be to try very hard to get a scholarship or a low-interest loan to a large flight academy, and then go to it.
If money is simply not available despite a search for sponsors, loans, and scholarships, then your choices are limited and you will have to keep working a wage job and add flight ratings and flight time locally in a small town until you reach the limit of the value of that activity. It is fairly easy to get Airplane Instructor (CFI) and Instrument Airplane (CFII) certificates living in a small town, but the MEI is often hard to obtain and there are almost never any students even if you do.
So I would proceed on your CFI and CFII and try and get a student or two after achieving them, adding flight time instructing as the local market allows, and look for low-end commercial gigs like skydiver flying. Actually, once you have the instructor certs low-end flying jobs will be much easier to get, because the teaching certs act as door openers. If a really good one comes along you can leave town and go full time, or at least continue to add single-engine time to your total.
At some point you are going to have over a thousand hours of single-engine time and adding more will be of diminishing value. You will want to concentrate on multi-engine time then. To do that you are going to need to have your MEI. I would say to look at the problem again at that point, because it is several years down the road. You may also meet a local person with a twin which would provide a unique solution. Good luck.