Another thing ...
When I first started cycling "seriously", I took out every single book on cycling from the local library ... small town, small library, 5 books on cycling ... and I read them from cover to cover. I can't remember off-hand which books they were, but I'm pretty sure I wrote them down somewhere ... however, they'd be quite old now.
Using those books, I set my 57 cm department store bicycle up as best I could (my current bicycle is 49 cm and was custom built for me, so that department store bicycle was just a wee bit too big for me ... but I absolutely could not afford anything else at the time), and I followed much of the advice in the books for what to wear, how to ride, how to train, and so on.
I grew up in a cycling environment, my parent's house was (and still is) full of bicycles, and my father subscribed to Bicycling Mag back when it was good ... in the 70s ... and he was the first cyclist I knew who wore padded shorts, a jersey, and a helmet, so I wasn't going into cycling with no background knowledge, but reading those books, and then experimenting with what they said, on my own really helped.