Help A New Player Out?

So I am a complete noob when It comes to civilization. As of now I play only civilization revolution but I have played civ 4 and 2 as well. Regardless of the fact that I enjoy this highly addictive game and have played it many times I'm still terrible at it. I play on the warlord difficulty and win most of the time. When I go up to the next level I get crushed. I don't really understand what to do and the guides that I have found on this forum generally confuse me. What is a good place to start when I want to learn about this game and how to get better?

watch some lets play civilization (fill in your desired civ here, ie 5, or rev, or 4) on youtube and copy their style of play. imitation is the highest form of flattery.

Try The strat archive, found here on the board...
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=300065
Or at the 2k forums which is a little more active...
http://forums.2kgames.com/showthread.php?23378-The-Civilization-Revolution-Strategy-Archive

In short, manually control your workforce for the first 20 or so turns, expand early, and know tech bonuses for reaching them early.

find me (scottieX on xbox and scottpi on ps3) and we can play a game of teams vs the AI and i can hopefully show you how I'd do it.

*you play teams because then you can see the other guys empire right from the first turn

Welcome to CFC JMC45!

Good to see some people still play Civ Rev.