Previously, when I've gotten stuck on something specific but also with some less well defined issues, I've started threads here and then gone onto further questions and discussion via email with people that have offered helpful replies.

IMHO the most useful thing a beginner can do is dream up their own project, no matter how modest or trivial it might be, play with the compiler and, through habitual use, get familiar with the development tools and the general development process. The cycle of writing, compiling, bug hunting / understanding the compiler output and testing a freshly compiled executable becomes less alien and the projects that get dreamed up become more ambitious. Go ahead and make mistakes - what's the worst that can happen?