Hi, I'm new to Minecraft also, just bought the game yesterday in fact. I am on the search for good, simple mods to use also, one that I've found is called "Zan's Minimap" and has a ton of useful features. You need something called "Liteloader" to run this mod, just google both and you should find them. I don't know if they're acceptable on World of Minecraft server's and I'm at this moment trying to contact a staff member to ask. Happy mining!