You're off to a good start with a bike repair stand.
If you don't already have them, prepare to drop some dough on proper tools. You'll quickly pay for them in shop labor savings.

Buy good quality housings and cables - you'll be cutting them to length. The LBS can sell it to you by the foot (Jagwire L3 is good quality) or you can buy packaged cable sets that include inner cables and housings.

+1 on the youtube education. Lots of good stuff there. The Park Tools site has some good videos as well.

If you have not had the bike tuned since you bought it, I'd recommend tearing it down to the frame and overhauling it. It is fun, empowering and pretty straghtforward if you have average mechanical skills.

If you get stuck, hit up the Mechanical subforum here.

Good luck and have fun!!!!!