Probably the best advice for you is to find someone experienced and take them with you.....barring that, you might just want to go to the track you've selected and watch for a while.

There's all kinds of diferrences in tracks and rules, e.g. tech inspection requirements, avoiding the waterbox, staging, catch can requirements, rules on exiting the track, etc.

Here are links to the 2 tracks near me......they have some good information. The lapeer dragway site has a pretty good primer for newbies.

http://www.milandragway.com/
http://www.lapeerdragway.com/