Definitely drop the play money and get on to some low stakes tables. Any of the sites recomended are good. Check bonus and affiliate offers before signing up on a new site....they may not be a big thing now, but later they may be.

There's an important line in SSHE...it goes something like "read the starting hand reccomendations, but don't get hung up on them. Concentrate on your post flop play." This is very important. Playing quality hands is only +EV preflop if you don't know what to do post flop and don't know when to fold. Also, I would suggest NOT reading a bunch of different books. Pick one(I suggest SSHE) and STUDY it. Read the whole thing. Then read it again. Then read it again. Take notes. Ask questions here. Play and apply the concepts, then reread.

There are some great posters here who are happy to "give back" by answering questions and helping out...use them as well.

I started out playing .5/1 at party 5 months ago and had a bad time the first 3000 hands or so. Then I picked up SSHE and started applying the concepts...my game got a little better and I started posting small wins. Don't expect huge gains over night, play your cards, ignore the suckouts and bad beats, and keep trying to improve your game.

Hope that helps