Hey @nick1980 I would recommend you sign up for https://minergate.com/a/51af3ea7c52a8a9e0b9f988e
It's 100% Free to join and you can use your current computer as your mining hardware. Very easy to start and they offer different types of Altcoins to chose from to get started. I have been with them for the past 6 months and have seen great results. Well just a good place to start if you want to get to know how mining works. Very widely used for Bitcoin mining Beginners. Hope this helps!