Robert... Cobalt and some frit encased in clear... super duper easy. Blue moon, caramel, amber purple are some good frits to start with. Not a whole lot of striking involved. You basically get a reaction from the metals kind of fuming itself. No matter when or where you start to strike colors, you're gonna have a learning process. It just takes a little time. Lori Robbins has a great book for frit beads as mentioned earlier. It involves striking and a lot of color reactions. It's a good place to start for semi instant results.