Before I ruin my phone

[jbg772]

I know this is probably going to get deleted or moved or something but real quick, I'm a newb to flashing roms and all that, so what I need to do is back-up my phone, get the MSID or whatever I need to get, hard reset my phone to set it to default settings (???) and then go ahead and download the new update, soft reset twice and practice patience so the phone can fully update, and then im good to go?