Im in a similar situation as the OP. Im currently a student, but im doing this for my own benefit, its not required. It only took me about 3 days to figure out the majority of the concepts for the android, its not as bad as it seems.
First thing, the IDE suggested for droid is Eclipse. Most of the official walkthroughs are focused on the Eclipse IDE.
Secondly, the language i suggest is Java. It seems that everything in the SDK is java, and im not sure there is support for others. Luckily Java and C++ are very similar in syntax so i dont think youll have much problem gaining momentum.
Once you follow the steps to install the SDK in the IDE, play around with Eclipse. It takes a little time to get used to the environment, especially laying out the interface(if like me, your not already familiar with XML). Eclipse is very nice in that the properties of everything you lay out can be viewed and changed in one place which helps int he learning process. You can drop items, change order, change parameters, and then look to see how the XML doc changed.
The next step is deciding what app you want to make. Start simple. I am working on one that uses features of the phone, but not much along the lines of utilizing outside resources(GMaps for example). Use your first app as something to familiarize yourself with how the droid functions, how the intents are passed, memory management, etc.
During this whole process, listen to people. The most important thing about app development is making something people will want to use. If they dont download it you wont make money. Listen to what people say they wish their phone did. I cant tell you how many ideas i have for apps that came to me preceded with an "I wish..."
Good luck on your new skill-set! I hope this helped.
