well, you seem to be on the right path, goal-wise. Many newcomers think they can create the next-wow-killer-mmorpg. You do not need to program like pros, but before going in to a rts which has a lot of different aspects, such as pathfinding, handling a lot of active units/entities at the same time, particle effects etc., you should start even smaller, at get to know that aspects of the game creation and the engine in separate small projects, i.e. one that focusing on the movement of entites, after that one that focusing in 2d features of the engine, then particle system, then pathfinding etc. this will both allow you to learn the engine better and it will prevent your motivation from breaking(if you go directly to a RTS you will face problems due to missing knowledge and it will break your motivation).

Welcome to the community, hope you have fun the engine.

Start from here: http://tutorial.3dgamestudio.net/

If you are new to engine, start with a smaller project, like a block-breaker game or that