As for on-line help, try checking out the notes at Perl Training Australia. These course notes are professionally developed, free to use, and generally a great start to Perl. They also make extensive references to the camel and other books, so they're a great companion text for when the full camel seems a bit daunting.

I'll admit a bit of a bias here, since my name is on all the notes and I teach and maintain them for a living. :)

The introduction and intermediate courses should provide a good grounding in all the basic concepts.

All the best,

Paul Fenwick
Perl Training Australia