Trivial dataclass cleanups: (GH-6218)

- When adding a single element to a list, use .append() instead of
  += and creating a new list.
- For consistency, import the copy module, instead of just deepcopy. This
  leaves only a module at the class level, instead of a function.
- Improve some comments.
- Improve some whitespace.
- Use tuples instead of lists.
- Simplify a test.