GG has made many excellent suggestions, and I will add a couple.
First and most important: Take a lesson. It will GREATLY reduce the learning curve and get you started down the right path right away. As an instructor I've had a number of students who had all kinds of weird habits from trying to learn on their own--including doing it backward!
Re this: "last thought, keep your knees and thighs close together. Beginners have a tendency to a wide stance called the poodle gap.
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Actually, with alpiners, the tendency I notice is keeping your thighs TOO close together. Nordic crossovers tend to poodle, not so much alpine crossovers. If you notice in my picture (not that it's perfect form, mind you) there is distance between my thighs--my rear knee is dropped back, not parallel with my front knee. Your knees should not be parallel. Your rear knee should be roughly a baseball width behind the front knee.
While cute, this girl is doing a typical stance from an alpine crossover
Her knees are next to one another, and she's dropped her lower leg behind her and she's pressing on her toe. Her front leg is blocking, no bend in the ankle and her foot is actually in front of her knee. You CAN make your skis turn this way, but it's not quite a tele turn.
Here's a poodle (if a poodle can run between your legs, they are too spread out). Also notice that his front ankle is not bent at all--you need to bend both knees and ankles:
This is a nice compact position-- front foot flat on the ski, ankle slightly bent, weight distributed between the skis (although you absolutely do not need to ski this low). I used this image because you can clearly see his nice leg position (friend of mine, great skier).
Close up of a woman skiing taller, nice form.
Also, you need to put much more weight on your back leg than you think. And even when you think you've got enough weight back there, you don't. At least not at first.
Anyway, I geeked out here a bit on stance, so I don't know how helpful it will be, at least at first. One last thing? HAVE FUN!!
