SONAR Powerstudio, recording newbie

[Riptide]

I'm looking at getting all my songs down onto my laptop, all I'm looking for is decent demo quality.
I've been trying to some research on how best to do this and also the cheapest way to do it.
So my understanding of digital recording is next to none.

I found this http://www.homerecordingconnection.com/ ... ory&id=893 and I was wondering if it would do what I want. I checked and my laptop meets all the maximum requirements and then some.
So from what I understand, all I would have to do is get a nice set of headphones or monitors and I would be able to record all my tracks (bass and guitar and vocals) and use a virtual drummer.
Also as stupid as this sounds, how do you get your guitar to sound distorted when using all this digital recording stuff. I see all the virtual modulation, reverbs, and delays but what do I use to get gain?

anyways any advice would be great for a newbie to digital recording