Great start m8. I've been reading a most enjoyable book lately on character design. It's actually called Digital character design and painting and it's by Don Seegmiller.
It works as methodology on how to approach character design no matter what media, as well as an introduction to Painter (Corel Painter) and how you can apply some of the thought process in this program. Some step by step, but more of principles and how to's as well as showing you features of painter.
Maybe this book is available at the local library? I highly recommend reading it and I hope our work will step up a couple of notches in quality from it