Linda Ann, sorry that I've been a little slow getting a reply to your question. I started to the other night and after teasing mombo, we lost our cable modem connection.

At any rate, Mark gave a pretty good treatise on what to do about intro photography courses. Community colleges are a very good idea but I'd look for an adult continuing ed class to take rather than one for a grade, unless you really want the credits for some reason. Another possiblity would be a local art institute if your town has one. Quite often they'll also offer leisure education classes in photography. Taking one of these courses is probably a good place to start as they'll teach you the basics of composition, depth of field (DOF) differences between shutter speeds and aperatures and how the interact, film types and speeds, etc.

As for cameras, Mark and Dave make good points about not spending a ton of $$$ unless you're really addicted the way I am (I'm way beyond obsessed!) A fixed focus point and shoot is the least expensvie way to go. Typically, they'll have a reasonably wide angle lens and will work generally well. The next step is an camera with an autofocus zoom lens. The wider the zoom range the more they'll cost, but at the same time the greater the versatility you'll have. This latter type of camera is probably a better choice for shooting lighthouses than a point and shoot with a fixed focus wide angle lens. You'd probably like to have a camera with a zoom range that goes to about 130 mm or perhaps longer. The autofocus zoom cameras Dave's right, will generally fall into the range of about $100-200. Those with longer telephoto zoom ranges will be at the upper end of the price range.

Going beyond the autofocus zoom cameras you get into 35 mm cameras with adjustable everything and interchangeable lenses. The intro price for these cameras is probably in the range of about the low $300 to start and there literally isn't an upper end to the price range (ask my wife!). Until you're reasonably certain that you're going to enjoy continuing with photography, you probably shouldn't take this step.

For films, print films are easier to deal with for the newcomer to photography. Generally, the speed of print films for comsumer use are 100, 200, 400, and 800. Most photography in daylight can be done with 100 or 200 speed film. The 400 and 800 speed films are more for either low light or action sports. Many of the simpler cameras don't allow the flexibility of changing film speeds and these cameras are generally best with lower speed print film. Personally, I shoot only slide film but I wouldn't recommend them to a beginning photographer as slide films are less forgiving that print films.

I hope that some of this helps you to get started. If you have more questions, don't hesitate to post them here. Someone will have an answer for you to be sure. There are a bunch of knowledgable photographers on these forums.

Gary