songs: something that you like, that's the best way to stay motivated (don't let anyone tell you that you need to map anime or whatever, it's just them mindlessly repeating shit they heard cause oooooohh you need to practice efficiently ooooohhh)
ranking process: check out the
wiki page, I wouldn't suggest thinking about it as a new mapper, though, cause it's a huge hassle in general and your early maps won't be good enough to be ranked anyway
tips:
- just map
- don't watch/read guides, just put a song into osu and start messing around in the editor
- don't get attached to your maps, it's more productive to just take what you've learned from one map and move on to the next, plus being stuck on one thing for a long time just drains your motivation; just map
- when you play the game try to think about why the mapper might have done what they did, as well as whether or not you think it actually works or if the idea is good in the first place