The answer to this question depends slightly upon which race/class you have chosen, but if you haven't typed 'wear all' or worn all the equipment you were given, you should definitely do that first. Now if you type 'practice' you will see a list of skills, and possibly spells, that you can practice. You will notice that one or more languages will be at 100%, and a particular weapon-type will be at 50%. The weapon-type should be that which you are wielding, for example warrior-types all begin with 50% in long blades and are initially given a broadsword to use. It is ALWAYS a good idea to stick to that weapon until you gain at least one level of experience. The reason for this is that if you switch, you will begin with only 10% in your new weapon-type (or 0 if you haven't practiced the right one yet) and needless to say, this will severely cripple your chances of landing blows in physical combat, something every low level class ends up doing quite a bit of. If you can't hit your opponent, chances are that you will die very quickly, especially at level 2.

WHERE do I Practice?

This done, you will need to find a trainer to practice some extra skills at. It is always a good idea to look at the help files for various skills, and to think about how they can/will apply to your current situation, usually meaning if they will help you win fights easier or not. If there is a NPC(non-player character) in the room you were gated to(where you ended up when you left the burning academy) and if that character is not obviously low level, they should be able to teach you a few skills. If there is no character in the room, try moving around a little bit, and you should be able to find someone to train you pretty quickly. Pay attention to what people say when you enter, there are usually helpful clues and hints on where to go to find things nearby. The more good the race you have chosen, usually, the more helpful the trainers will be for you. For instance, the drow tend to be extremely cruel and mean, and this tends to imply that its harder to get directions for a drow character than for something such as an elf.

WHAT do I Practice?

Once you have found a trainer, you can try to practice whatever skills you've deemed necessary or helpful for yourself. If you get a message saying that no one here can teach you, this means you have not yet found a trainer, and you should keep looking and try again at a different NPC character. Some people advise practicing skills that are easy to advance in, such as scan, initially for easy experience, others think that saving the easy experience until higher levels is a better idea. In the end it remains up to each player to decide how he or she will run each character, and which skills pertain more or less to that characters abilities, but for some classes there are definitely some skills that will greatly speed the progress up.

When you are done practicing your skills and spells you will need to try to find something to fight against to gain experience. This can be done by exploring the area you are in, or those nearby if it is a reasonably friendly region (the elven forest is pretty safe for instance, but NOT the Underdark). You should keep your eye out for things that make sense for you to kill or fight, and once you find something reasonably small/acceptable, use the consider(or con) command to see how you will fare in a fight against it. Look for things that are pretty close to your level and strength. If it tells you that you will die, unless you are a monstrously large troll, it is probably very accurate in saying that, and if you do pick the fight, you will very quickly end up back at your startup room with a corpse in front of you. If you think you have a good chance, then you can literally try to kill whatever it is you are looking at and it will start a fight for you.

Here Goes Nothing...

Now since this was your first fight, I'd bet you got whooped on pretty badly. This means your hp are probably a little low, and it would be a good idea to sleep until your character heals up fully. This will also allow you to recover mana quicker if you are a casting class. Whenever an in-game hour passes, your hp/mana/move will all change slightly depending on how hungry/thirsty you are as well as what position your character is currently in. The hours go by about every minute, but while you are asleep you can press enter or check your score sheet until you see them recover or drop slightly.

I'm Not Healing but I am Sleeping! What's Up?

If they go down instead of up, then there are several possibilities.
The first is that you were poisoned during the fight. This would be very bad at low levels. If you saw a message about shivering and suffering than this is what has happened, and you are in pretty big trouble. If this is the case then you should first try to find a fountain to rest at as that will probably slow down the damage it will do to you, and second make sure you aren't hungry or thirsty when you do go to sleep. It is advisable to type "aff" pretty often to check the duration on the poison. It counts down battle ticks which happen about every 2-3 seconds, so its not quite as bad as if it counted them in hour ticks. When your poison wears off you should rest one or two more hour ticks to be sure your mind is totally healed up too.
The other possible reason you are losing hit points is that you have let yourself get hungry or thirsty or both. If this is the case then you will need to find a source of water, and perhaps eat some of that jerky you started up with. Check your inv (inventory) to see if you are carrying anything to eat or drink. If you come across a fountain in your travels, it's a good idea to remember it, and use it as a landmark and a resting place. They provide an endless source of water as well, which is great for avoiding dehydration. If you do not have any jerky in your inventory, then you will just have to go hungry until you can kill enough creatures that something or someone leaves behind a body part for you to eat (guts arms legs…).

I'm All Better and Itching to Go!

After you've recovered your hp completely, you should be ready to kill something again for some more experience. The same rules apply, only this time, you should be slightly better at wielding your chosen weapon, so it will be a little bit easier. Repeat the killing/healing process, but if you did get poisoned, find something ELSE to fight and hopefully that won't poison you. Eventually you should gain enough experience to advance to level 3. Congratulations, you are now making some progress!

After each level be sure to check your practice sheet to see if you have any new skills you want to learn. If you do want to practice something then you will need to find your trainer again to do so. Once you have gotten to level 3, feel free to ask other players or immortals via the OOC channel if you have any questions, however, be forewarned that they would prefer you to check 'help files' before you ask them. As always, if you expect to actually receive help, you should probably be respectful and courteous to those whom you are asking.
O.K, one last thing, it is usually a good idea to customize your regular prompt, this can be done by following the directions in help prompt, and can really increase playability of your character by making useful information readily available (such as experience required to gain a level so you don't have to read so much every time you want to check on that).

Good Luck and Happy Playing!

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