I agree this should be right at the top but as has been discussed here before, the docs aren't written for beginners; or non-programmers for that matter. They take a great deal for granted. So assuming they answer beginner questions isn't necessarily a good idea. Even when the answers are there, they are often unintelligible to the neophyte. A beginner seeing things like split /PATTERN/,EXPR,LIMIT is as unenlightened as if she'd seen nothing at all.