Excited To Be Here

Hi guys.

I'm Archer99 (just 'Archer' was taken) from Norway. If you're wondering where that is, well... it's very far north, and it's snowing like a MF right now.

I feel like I should have discovered this forum years ago, but I'm here now luckily

My goal here is to learn everything SEO, drive organic traffic to my store, and preferably not use any paid ads to get sales. I'm not a complete noob in terms of SEO, but you could say that I'm a noob here compared to the rest of the community, most likely. Amongst my friends, I'd probably be considered a genius because well, who really knows this stuff in the real world?

I'd love some pointers on how to get started with learning SEO from A-Z, if there are any guides/courses you recommend (both paid/non-paid courses), I'd love to hear from you.

I also have some general questions if someone could answer, that would be greatly appreciated:

1. What's the best SEO practice in terms of hats; is the "dark" side really all that? Should I learn all things whitehat, blackhat, or a mixture of both?
2. How likely is it to get caught using blackhat techniques? Now this is very broad, but assuming you do it correctly, will Google still f*** you over? What are the risks?
3. Can someone review this service and tell me if it's legit? I'm tempted to try, but really not sure if it's worth it. Here's the website: brandpush.co
4. How fast can someone master the art of SEO? Right now, I'm unemployed so I have all the time in the world to learn. I guess it's pretty difficult to answer, but let's say core SEO basics?

Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here and to learn from each other.