Welcome to the Quilting Board! You'll find lots of help here, in addition to your friend, of course. And we're lots of fun, too.
I couldn't figure out how to change your name, but if you click on "Help", and then scroll all the way to the bottom, there's a place where you can contact the Quilting Board. I'll bet they know how to change your name! And I'll bet they're very helpful as well.
You really don't mean you're going to start with a whole quilt. Say you don't mean it! You'll be overwhelmed before you are part way into the project, trust me. I remember only too well what it was like to be a complete Newbie, and I was an excellent seamstress prior to that, and thought quilting would be "easy". Ha! It's a different skill all together. The sewing experience just helped me to sew straighter seams faster. No, you need to think smaller. I started with pot holders. Made lots of mistakes but learned to put patterns together on a small scale, put together a "sandwich" of quilt-like top, batting & backing, do basic quilting to hold them together, and finally to put on the binding. I made lots of mistakes, but it didn't matter because they were only pot holders, small stuff. I even threw some away. Then I made some place mats. More complicated patterns to piece, more putting together of the "sandwich", more complicated quilting, more binding. I have 2 sets of those place mats (threw one away -- just didn't turn out -- color combo was awful). But I kept learning, kept practicing free motion quilting on "sandwiches" made of pieces of worn out sheets. Then I made a table topper, and did a good job of it. Only had to tear apart and fix 3 seams. For me, that was a miracle! Then I moved on to a lap quilt. Oh, it was agony getting it to turn out like a rectangle, and I ended up making a bigger one than planned because I had to add "uneven" trim to my uneven rectangle in order to make it come out a perfect rectangle. An experienced quilter showed me how. Then I had to put together my (larger) lap quilt top with my batting and my backing, and then hand baste it together so that when I quilted it, the pieces wouldn't slide around and become uneven or puckered. What a nightmare. I was nervous the entire time I was quilting it. But it came out --- not perfect --- but pretty darn nice! And then I did a small quilt. By then, I had been able to practice all of the skills I would need to complete the task of making the quilt, and it did not seem overwhelming. In fact, that's when I really began to enjoy quilting, and now I'm in love with it. Please, Please, re-think your approach to learning this new skill, and don't sabotage your efforts by starting out with something that's too big. Learn and make your mistakes on the small stuff. You'll be glad you did. If you don't want to do it the way I did, well, there's absolutely nothing wrong with starting with your small quilt first.
O.K., there's your first piece of advice. Now, let the fun begin!