I was a 'newbee' until a month or two ago on cgi's....here is a good place to start, and they have some informative pages on dealing with it all, of course your server administrator SHOULD help you with this too. At least mine does, why the hell do you think you pay someone??? Start here for some good scripts and info:
http://www.freeperlcode.com/guide/ http://www.comp.leeds.ac.uk/Perl/start.html
I knew NOTHING about cgi's and in a week or two, it was all set up, and now I know how to modify the code somewhat, load, and make them work for my pages! (Pic post script/classifieds ads/top 100 lists/chat room/bulletin boards/password-security) It's a whole new ball of wax! (I thought html was difficult!!!) But now cgi is getting easier every day!
Take a look if you care at my site and see for yourself:
http://carnalpassion.com is my entrance page to the above scripts in use.
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http://carnalpassion.com