You are a newbie in this game & practically don't wish to publicly embarrass yourself in front of your buddies when you display your new altitude on the table, it doesn't have to be that way again, you now have an option to learn billiards online from the Pros of billiard.
The secret to prosperity in any game no matter how hard you think it is to play the game is just a matter of knowing all the rules & tricks of the game. If you desire to become a pro in the game, focusing and mastering the skills and techniques of playing the game before jumping to the board as a player should be your first consideration to come to mind. Though mastering these techniques and tricks especially in billiard is not going to be anything close to reading the normal ABCs you can find billiards online lessons & tutorials & then learn and master the rules & techniques. And it then becomes pretty easy.
Thousands of websites are now giving away free tutorials and video lessons on how to become a pro in playing billiard games though a lot of sites. They come from different backgrounds but reading from too many experts could be very confusing especially if you are new to the game. But one sure thing is that the basic rules never change even when you read from a hundred authors. These include:
Goal of playing billiard
Terms for playing billiard
Moves that causes players to lose the game
These 3 basic rules are very important to note when playing or learning billiards online & even other related games like snooker closely relate basic rules which means that if you could play either of one then coping with billiards won't be that difficult.