Duplex,
Firstly , learning how to model depends entirely on your natural talent:
This will Determine if you woud lneed to go to school for it, simply start or would have to persue some other course.
I personally learnt the BAsic (And you'll see why I call it Basics) by being trained at a discreet learngin centre (Autodesk, the guys who own 3DS Max and now MAYA)
As soon as I finished my course, and being as naive as they come I thought the game developent business was mine for the taking.
BOY!! Was I ever wrong!!
I had to go through endless , countless hours fo practising and honing my skills, doing tutorials after tutorials , working as a freelancer, then doing some more tutorials.
After my skills had improved enough to enter the game industry , and actually to this very day I still practice almost endlessly.
Tkaing this into account, I would suggest, deciding on a package that you would like to use.
Try to teach yourself the basic by doing exercises and tutorials.
Then , start focusing on becoming proficcient at modeling.
It takes a lot of hard work and immense amounts of dedication , but if you practice long enough and if you dedicate yourself to learning from every model you creat, you can become a good modeler.
