I hate to rain on your parade Simon but if by "New Year" you mean you want to start flying in January then the weather may have something to say about that. The weather in the UK in winter is worse than s**t and it might not be a nice introduction to flying for you to turn up at the airfield in the freezing cold only to hear "no flying" as some thunderstorm kicks in. Repeatedly. Even if you did get to fly the weather might prevent you from getting the most benefit from your lesson. I would suggest that you start in the spring when the weather is more favourable because I can't see you getting up very often in the winter.
For example, last winter I booked about once every week and didn't fly for over 3 months. I was using an older plane that couldn't take such strong winds etc but it gives you an idea of how restrictive the weather can be.
You seem very keen so how about getting some of the ground subjects out of the way in this awful weather, that way you will not have them hanging over you (like me) and you'll pick stuff up quicker when you start flying.