The easiest way, bar none, is to look up the club in your county and go to their meetings. You'll find someone there who will be your "Elmer" and personally teach you stuff. Hams are easy, just show up and start hanging out. Participate.
There's also hamstudy.org (free and will get you through the tests).
And of course the ham radio crash course:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChAu6Cof9KlfFxSbL9ytosQ
For those that wanna get their ham tickets in a real hurry, you can go to qrz.com and just grind on the practice tests. I got through tech and general in about five days doing it that way myself.
Get gud with radios and you'll be able to build one yourself. The principles are basically the same, you're just utilizing them in a different way.
The only real way to learn radios is to play with radios. The only way to play with radios is to get the ticket.
Put simply: You need operator experience, and no ham will give you the time of day on the air if you don't have a callsign. You can thank the FCC for that, but that's the way it is.
Technically your wireless router is a repeater. It's just low power and short range.
Boring. Takes about 10 minutes to track people down.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/KN2C-DDF2020T-Radio-Direction-Finder-kit-TSCM-RDF-100MHz-1000MHz-/183804551884
Heh.. "set up" requires only turning the car on for some hams..
A lot of hams are worth trolling because of their gatekeeping bullshit. It's a hobby that tends to attract misanthropes, unfortunately.
Perhaps, but there are a great many legendary feuds within the community for various reasons, and gatekeeping is a real problem. I quite welcome this unexpected turn of events on the chans that's suddenly generating interest in it. The community needs an influx of fresh blood and ideas.