heatherpattern asks, "if you have any recs for things, I'd appreciate them. You mentioned that you did Access development, I kinda feel like I'm in an earlier place on your path, less pretty design."

When I was doing Access work I just went to Half Price Books and grabbed whatever was available. Access work is ok and the pay can be good if certified but I found it ultimately restricting and dull.

I started learning PHP out of high school and I just did a lot of Google searching to find what I needed. A great way is to start a blog or small site using Drupal or Wordpress, then start reading the code, learning how they make your site work. As you learn, you can change things around until it is your own.

Learning MySQL is free and will help get you acquainted with all of the proper SQL syntax. A lot of programming languages abstract databases out into objects, so most mid-end developers never have to learn about SQL optimization, but if you are working back end, knowing it is your butter.