starting a business at 17, any advice?

[Andy K]

Hi. I'm un-employed at the moment, but i'm training to be a sparkey at college, anyway the course is only . day a week and i can't find any work for the rest of the week and so i'm bored out of my mind and i also needs some money. anyway my idea is to start a small "business" online selling cheap electronics goods, and although there's a reccession this seems the best time of this year to sell things, just before xmas. i have noticed though the electronics market seems to be pretty full and most other related markets seem to be as well. i've also heard that here in the uk you can sell upto around £5000 worth of items without having to pay business taxes or be officialy a business, is this true and how would you prove that you had not gone over this to inland rev? any advice would be nice, also if anyone knows any useful sites or info i can access that would be useful as well. thanks