The way Disney is presenting it now is that there are multiple canons, which is in the spirit of Lucas had always seen it. For him the movies were the only truest canon, and he considered it within his rights to veer away from anything in the comics or novels if he wanted to in future movies. Then they did the prequels, and he counted them as part of his main canon, even though they contradicted some of the novels and comics. Then they did Clone Wars, and that was also considered by him to be part of his main canon.
The novels and comics were always considered the Expanded Universe, meaning that there was a secondary canon that included as much of that that could be consistent with the movies and cartoons as those were produced. A lot of the old Marvel comics were inconsistent, e.g. they had an alien who walked around on two feet who was Jabba the Hut (misspelled, too). They also had a big green humanoid bunny, for what it's worth. But the Dark Horse comics in the 90s and most of the novels were all part of that.
When Disney bought it, they created a new canon. That new canon consists of the two trilogies of movies Lucas did, Clone Wars, the new Marvel comics just being produced now, the new Rebels show just being produced now, and any future movies and novels produced under this new order.
I think the best way to think about it now is that there are four alternate reality timelines that have been explored in various media. There's the universe with the Lucas-produced stuff but without either the old Marvel line, the novels, or the more recent comics or Disney stuff. There's the universe that includes the original trilogy and the Marvel comics. There's the universe that includes the bulk of the Expanded Universe but not those Marvel comics. Then there's the new Disney canon. All of them can be thought of as existing universes within a shared multiverse, where (as far as we know) there's no contact across universes but are all within one big fictional multiverse. That allows you to enjoy all of it and treat it as happening within a fictional world, but that world has several timelines that are very different from each other in some ways.
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The novels and comics were always considered the Expanded Universe, meaning that there was a secondary canon that included as much of that that could be consistent with the movies and cartoons as those were produced. A lot of the old Marvel comics were inconsistent, e.g. they had an alien who walked around on two feet who was Jabba the Hut (misspelled, too). They also had a big green humanoid bunny, for what it's worth. But the Dark Horse comics in the 90s and most of the novels were all part of that.
When Disney bought it, they created a new canon. That new canon consists of the two trilogies of movies Lucas did, Clone Wars, the new Marvel comics just being produced now, the new Rebels show just being produced now, and any future movies and novels produced under this new order.
I think the best way to think about it now is that there are four alternate reality timelines that have been explored in various media. There's the universe with the Lucas-produced stuff but without either the old Marvel line, the novels, or the more recent comics or Disney stuff. There's the universe that includes the original trilogy and the Marvel comics. There's the universe that includes the bulk of the Expanded Universe but not those Marvel comics. Then there's the new Disney canon. All of them can be thought of as existing universes within a shared multiverse, where (as far as we know) there's no contact across universes but are all within one big fictional multiverse. That allows you to enjoy all of it and treat it as happening within a fictional world, but that world has several timelines that are very different from each other in some ways.