Welcome to the boards and to quilting.
I'm a thrifty quilter not necessarily by choice but I do feel it is part of the experience. I wish I had money for classes and new fabrics but I don't... I'm lucky that where I live and because I go regularly, I find a lot of high quality fabric at thrift stores. No, they don't have cutting tables and you have to take what you get and the amount there is, but most of them have a "linen" section or a craft section with fabric in bags or on hangers. I will say it does help that I'm in Seattle, a rather wealthy part of the country but whenever I visit places I check and I usually find something.
I turn down a lot of fabric, most of what I get is high quality yardage by brand names. This past weekend I got a couple lovely multiple yards of Hoffman one was a juvenile print and the other gold embellished pine cones that has great potential, a really nice piece of Civil War style fabric by Judy Rothermel big enough for borders and sashing, and some smaller bits. True, a couple of the stores I visited I left empty handed. I recommend getting to know your local stores, which ones are likely to have fabric, which ones have good prices, and then develop a route and regular routine of looking. I like to go Thursday mornings which is "tag day" at Goodwill, the first day they go on sale.
I used to do more on-line shopping than I do now. When I give up searching my stash, my first stop is Equilter.com, I have other places, and in the past year I've found some great deals on Amazon.