very first setup help

Hi all,

I have finished building my cnc router, and have tested the axes using EMC, so all is good so far. I want to my first cut now, and I am confused to say the least. I do not have home or limit switches yet. In EMC, I load a gcode, and set my home position. I now want to set up the block I will be cutting. How do I use the touch-off feature, and how do I link this to the home position? Also, say I have moved the axes from their home positions, is there a way to get EMC to return to them just with a click on something? Finally, all three steppers are set exactly the same, but the z axis sounds very sweet and makes a normal whining noise, while the other two sound rough - they seem to work ok, but do not sound like the z axis. I cannot find any basic tutorials on emc for dumb beginners like me, so any help will be greatly appreciated.

Regards,

Brian