Welcome to the passion!
Bees are one of those creatures that just grab hold & won't let go!
To answer a few of your questions, YES! geographical location is hugely important & makes a massive difference! Here in New Zealand we have had to 'write our own books' if you like, as there is limited value in what is written for other countries. As far as bee health etc, different diseases in different places (states?
), bee 'biology' is basically the same, but you will need to have different management practices depending on the 'breed' of bee you have.
The classes will be a great learning tool, as the information should be specific to your area.
Being small scale commercial (both hubby & I are full-time beekeepers) I would recommend the langstroth hive (particularly if you are purchasing a nuc) it is so easy when everything is interchangeable
( I'm betting you don't stay at 1 hive!) With the boyfriends woodworking skills it should be easy enough to build your own gear (even I can do it!) but do pay particular attention to the bee space, no 'near enough' approach, they will gum up any gaps that are too big or too little & make working the hive really difficult!
As far as extracting, if you use the plastic foundation you can scrape the honey off to the mid-rib without having to invest in an extractor. Of course your bees will have to re-draw the comb (we tend to protect our comb a lot!) but this is no different than what you would be doing in a top-bar hive anyway!
That turned out to be rather a long post! Sorry about that! Any questions I'm happy to help, as far as geographical location will allow