Hy Dave, great to hear that you are also interested.
In the Audio link at the left are some instructions, granted I made a couple of faux pas, but we were just getting started.
The method I/most used was Sound Recorder, and all that is required is a mike...
no tape deck, just a mike and a folder for filing into, here is the link, there are some step by step instructions if you wade through, lol, but any problems just post here, Zy
PS there is also help for storage and memory conservation later.