Well, don't do like I do!
What I mean by that is stick to one era, one nation, that way you won't have to buy 30 different bottles of paint to accurately represent the models you do build. I have US, UK, German and Japanese aircraft, so I've ended up with 4 greens, 4 (or more) greys, etc.
Get a selection of relatively inexpensive brushes, ie don't buy the best and don't buy the cheapest. The cheap ones are crap, and you'll likely wreck the good ones until you get experienced with brush work. Head to the makeup counter at the local drug store for finger nail emery boards for sanding and pick up a couple of the smaller size blue painter's masking tape at the hardware store. Testor's or Tamiya liquid cement is better than tube glue, and also pickup some Zap-a-gap CA glue for fast bonds and gap-filling. Careful of that though, you can glue your hand to the model real easy! Better pickup some Curex nail polish remover, just in case. The Acetone base breaks down CA glue very quickly. Skin, by the way, is really difficult to sand off the side of your model.
Oh, and bookmarks these two links http://www.craigcentral.com/models/ and http://swannysmodels.com/ between those two sites you can have most questions answered. And come back here often, the other posters have forgotten more about modeling than I know. Most of what I posted here I learned in these hallowed halls.