Two Questions: Learning LUA & Custom Animations in game

[Aryae21]

First and foremost I am well aware that tampering with Blizzards MPQ Files is banable. Blizzard gets very cranky when you mess with them. It's a big no-no I am very aware of and mean absolutely no harm. However... I have recently discovered that we can still use these files.
For example, weakauras provides 3D animations for many of the MPQ files, and its allowed as interface effects, just like a KGPanels texture is, except its from Blizzards own animations. My question is, if I were to make my own animation, from complete scratch, nothing to do with Blizzards files...
Is it possible to still get it in game, as part of an interface, like weak auras does? Id prefer to use weak auras to do it, but I haven't found any sort of method to "load" it in like KGPanels for example.

Second question, I figured I'd toss it in the same post as to not clutter up forms with a billion of my questions. The community on here has been simply, amazing. I want to give back, to learn LUA and contribute as well as be able to help myself not always have to ask for here it. But coding is still foreign to me, I've learned a lot from designing my own interface. But the process is rather... well slow. I figured, the best way to learn was to actually do my own add on. I'm not asking for help, but rather a shove in the right direction. Suppose I'm asking for opinions and anyone's own experience about how they learned LUA? I've been on the internet to search for a "LUA for dummies" But I don't seem to find any concrete book or guide.