OK, new to all of this and I hope these pages will be of use to those following me down this tricky route!
I am using Simon Monk's book 'Programming FPGAs: Getting Started with Verilog'as a useful and gentle introduction.
Mainly because Monk uses it in his book, I am using a Mojo FPGA board and Mojo Shield for my investigations (from EmbeddedMicro.Com) which are pictured alongside.