Signal Chain Techniques

[kervickblows]

I'm gonna expose some ignorance here, but hopefully what i learn as a result will be worth it.

I've been a long time musician, spent many an hour in some pretty nice studios. However, i didn't pay the most attention to what the engineer was doing, and even when i wanted to learn, didn't want to interrupt, slow him down, bother the poor guy, etc.

So now i've entered the world of recording myself, and though i have one friend whose heavily into it, he's about as useful as tits on a bull when it comes to explaining things. So here's what i've gathered so far.

I've got a Daw, a few good preamps, some mics, a bunch of plug ins, and a decent compressor. This is what i was told i would need. My question is about all of this 'bussing" i keep hearing about, staying "in the box", "out of the box" etc.

What i do know is that, opinions and preferences aside, there must be a path that many "good" recordings use that is simpler than others. And that's what i'm looking for most. Here's what I've ascertained, and i'd love to hear feedback on it. Tell me I'm a moron, I don't care, but just make sure you tell me why and what I can do to not be one.

source>mic>pre (with eq)>compressor>daw>****aroundsomewithplugins>now what?

should i be mastering? bussing something somewhere (keep in mind i have no idea what the hell that means) basically, what can i do now to make what i have sound better before i burn it to disk?