I happen to be the person who started the help channel, which is a great place to ask all these questions as well as to get to know people in the community. Swift touched on this briefly but I though I'd just add to it. Anyway, if you are interested, you can follow the link in my sig to find out more.
Additionally I recommend you visit the wiki, this will help give you a lot better idea of who the NPC factions are and it is much more organized than the faction status page.
Finally I recommend you explore around the forums some more as there is a welcome forum but you put your welcome post elsewhere. This in itself is no big deal, but since most of the official communication takes place on the forums it is good to know your way around them.
Most of all though, Have Fun!
PS. I also recommend you explore your options and not just listen to the first recruiter that comes along, there are many factions that will have you.