The following link is a great starting point
They have a pretty good idea of what it takes to make
a drupal run site.
http://www.dogstar.org/drupal/content/rapid-drupal-site-recipe
Of course there are tons of resources on drupal.org itself.
Check out the hand book for information on how to install drupal,
how to use it, and of course the modules.(the best part of drupal)
It's all free, open source, and has a very robust community.
Antonio
P.s. This site is running on Drupal