Resto shaman in trinity group

I'm cobbling a new group together from two abandoned groups and my old main, to the tune of Warrior tank, three Mages for DPS and a restoration Shaman healer. I'm having a lot of fun with it but end up in a lot of trouble when the group takes AOE damage.

Chain Heal is the obvious way to deal with this, but I'm finding its mechanics don't make it a simple Prayer of Healing substitute. If the tank is the target of the Chain Heal, it streams to him (usually way up front) but will not bounce back to the rest of the group; if a DPS is the target, then the tank is left out of the heal. How do people usually deal with this? Is it just necessary to keep the tank and DPS/healer close together when you've got a resto shaman, or is there something I'm missing?

Also, is it correct that I should save Riptide for AOE heals and not leave it in my spam heal rotation, or is it worth it for single-target tank healing even if it's not likely a Chain Heal will bounce to it?

Thanks. :)

When I used a resto shaman, I had a healing key for each toon, and on a modifier it would cast chain heal instead of lesser healing wave.

What I did with my resto shaman is macro riptide and water shield to the dps spam button. Earth shield is inserted to my follow macro so I never start a fight without earth shield on the tank. I have four chain heal macros that target the three dps and resto shaman. For me there's no point in casting chain heal on the tank because all my dps are casters.

Point of note... Chain heal is a smart heal. if you just cast it with yourself as the target it will jump (glpyhed) to the other 3 dps.
just make 2 dps buttons. one where the healer heals the tanks, 1 where the healer spams Chainheal at himself.
end result is keeping the group alive. and if you find your tank ends up in trouble. just back him so he gets clipped by the Chain heal as well.

You usually don't cast ch on the tank due to the range problems you mentioned. Just make sure the tank has earth shield up (make sure you got the glyph) , throw a riptide on him if things get rough and chain heal your dps in the back.

Good ideas, thanks!

The way I have it as of last night is, the spam button cycles through a LHW on the tank every three-ish seconds, then Riptides and Chain Heals a mage. I also have five buttons to cast Greater Healing Wave on each party member ...

I guess what I need to do is remove the Chain Heal from the spam sequence, and change the Greater Healing Wave buttons 2-5 to do Chain Heal instead? I like to do as little direct healing as possible but it seems like this will strike a decent balance between overhealing the party at the tank's expense, and having to pay too much attention to pressing healing buttons.