There used to be a Finale Listmail group--don't know if it still exists, but it was helpful because there were many people there who were at various stages in the learning curve--I think that it expanded to other notation programs, as well--anyway, the best thing is to connect, in some way, with others who are doing what you want to do--

As per the MIDI thing--I go both ways--when I know what I want, it is actually much easier to just type the dots, but when I am writing, especially the other parts, the MIDI lets me hear what I've written immediately--

When I first got Finale, it was simply create lead sheets and piano arrangements for songs that I had written--but within a week or so I was fooling around with multipart stuff, because for the first time, I really could(I have the worst hand in the world, and gave up writing arrangements as soon as I finished school)--