You're going to love it. There's something so relaxing about hand quilting and I wish I was able to do more myself. My stitches aren't perfect, but there's such a feeling of accomplishing something beautiful that it's addictive.
Granted, I'm absolutely hopeless with using thimbles and have collected quite a few over the years, and some are now residing in my thimble display cabinate. The best thing and only thing I've come across that works for me is... sticking plasters.
Before I start any quilting I wrap a few strips round my 'sewing' fingers with the padded gauze squares on top of each other. It's not the ideal solution, but it's comfortable, pain free and I won't lose it/them.