How to learn/get started bioinformatics?
The formal answer is O'Reilly "Bioinformatics programming, using Python". Check out the classic O'Reilly texts on "Mastering Perl for bioinformatics", and possibly"Beginning Perl for bioinformatics" (which is likely far too basic), which establish some core principles and have a solid reputation in teaching. However, the Perl/Python thing might get confusing (I dunno).

If you are statistics orientated at a guess, O'Reilly's, Bioinformatics data skills... I don't know, but something that would focus on R.

The real goal is core-technical competance because the biological understanding will be taught by your supervisor. Thereafter you might turn your attention to teaming up with a lab for project training.