Just charge it til it's full is fine these days. I usually charge for about 30 minutes longer or so but these phones turn off the charger when the phones full now so it makes no difference..
First steps:
Set up your emails, change your theme colour, connect your calendar to your PC calendar (if you use outlook - highly recommend)
Set up Ebay app
download whatsapp!
download PayPal.
Download "Purple Cherry GBC" for Pokemon (gameboy colour emulator!)
Download skydrive.