a book-free way to do it would be to start with reading an introduction such as:...

a book-free way to do it would be to start with reading an introduction such as: http://www.codecommit.com/blog/scala/roundup-scala-for-java-... (not really entertaining, but good content)

Once you are done with that, read articles on the fantastic Daily Scala blog: http://daily-scala.blogspot.com/ . There are LOTS of useful little morsels in there.

For a beginner asking questions, stackoverflow is IMO the place to go, the people on the mailing lists can sometimes be a bit hostile towards newbies.