Really, Taric isn't that exciting, but he's a very safe pick who teaches you very good habits. His long stun range encourages you to hang back and poke, while waiting for a strong advantage before you commit with his full kit. Most importantly, stay close to your ADC and stun anyone who tries to dive him/her. Keep looking for a good time to land a clutch heal, and remember to auto-attack to lower the Q cooldown when it's safe (but don't steal minion farm or push the lane unnecessarily!)

I suggest getting AS runes and masteries and buying a Tear of the Goddess to make use of Gemcraft, but otherwise it's not worth spending gold on, especially as a support.

As a top laner, you might be free to experiment more, but I have not thoroughly tested top lane Taric; such a project would take me a lot of Normal games to come to a conclusion. A tear and an early RoA will make Taric into a bursty bruiser with strong heals, and a full Muramana makes his E a legitimate nuke.

PROS:

* Really safe support pick
* Tear + utility + AS option adds some damage to the mix
* Luxury Manamune can make a difference in long games
* Scales pretty well
* Optional: unconventional top laner can be a bit unexpected to enemy team.

CONS:

* Taric can be boring to play
* No game-breaking mass CC ultimate