I Got It - now What The Hell Do I Do With It?

The very cheap, learn-to-play mandolin has arrived along with a pitch pipe, picks, and a really cheap cloth bag to slip it in. Made in China is emphasized everywhere on this model.... but I got it to learn, er should I say, figure out if I CAN learn it. My dear hubby played guitar many moons ago, so he so wonderfully tuned it for me. He is SO awesome. Then I picked it up and said, "now what?" Just strumming it doesn't do too much. That E, D, G, and A don't sound too nice together. I picked at a couple strings and oohed and aahhed. What about a chord or two? What about a real note? Something that actually sounds like a note? Well....I got my handy-dandy "Learn to Play the Mandolin for Beginners" book and started looking at some fingering of chords. Ouch! Can you really manipulate your fingers in some of those positions? Poor Rick's big fingers just couldn't do it on that tiny little neck. Mine were a little better, but holy hell there's some odd positions. And then I got to thinking... ok; you got these 8 strings playing 4 different notes then you got all these yoga-like fingering positions to coincide with those strings. Maybe, just maybe I can do some chords and strumming, but how the hell do the virtuosos get going so friggin' fast picking a melody and moving those fingers in those crazy positions? Holy hell. This is going to be quite the learning experience. I'm ready for another snow storm and day off with nuthin' to do... but strum a little. Have mandolin, will travel. I think that's what it will take to learn... a lot of picking whenever I get a second.