You hit the nail on the head Dries - at least for me. I have a Drupal install on one of my sites and have a strong interest in improving it. I have mid-level PHP skills meaning I still need to learn some fundamentals ... oop code being one of them. I'd like to help but I need to take small bites and learn what I need to learn with some help here and there. I don't need the manual read to me. I do occassionally need someone to say "read this" and give me a link or tell me what to look for. I like Drupal very much since I started using it this summer. I have issues with some aspects of it but I haven't gotten under the hood yet except to hack at the themes. Needless to say, I'm wet behind the ears and am slowly working to get up to speed.
So all this being said, I'd like to know what - if anything - I could do to help.
Helping out in the issue tracker (analyzing bugs, reproducing bugs, fixing bugs, testing fixes) is a great way to get involved with Drupal development. Just pick the issues that look _fun_ to work on. :) -- Dries Buytaert :: http://www.buytaert.net/