Thanks for the helpful replies - I guess there is no one central place to go for testing, otherwise everyone would be touting it on their websites. Probably a good thing -
SEO is such a mutable industry that such a test would be out of date before it went live.
I am doing well enough as a writer right now, but when my projects run out I will definitely do some more work on both my blogs and optimizing a friend's business site for local search. And yes, confidence is something I definitely need to work on, so I will take special note of that very valuable advice and "get going".
Thanks for your input and if anyone has any further advice for someone starting out I'd love to hear it here or via PM.