Hello John,
Well, start with MS-Works database then which comes pre-installed on many PCs. Often people don't know they have received a database with that. It's bascially the same thing but limited in number of entried IIRC. Probably a huge limit.
I bought a book that explains it, cost me $20 at a bookstore. "Works Companion" by Cobb. I don't know if still in print but there should be plenty of others. After that it was all a breeze and I set up databases for everything that needed one. All my biz book keeping runs that way, then the parts database, billing records and so on.
A database has the advantage that you can sort, select and organize any way you want. Sales tax reporting and stuff like that reduces itself to entering the month for which you want to do it and then clicking on the desired report. That's it. It's the same when you want to figure your tax pre-payments. Just run that a couple weeks before due date and you'll know (if you were diligent with entries). If I want to know what kind of Schmitt trigger chips are on hand in the lab it's the same process. No more need to rummage through the parts bins.
Regards, Joerg