1) yes, it will do and yes, there are better.
If you get a good skimmer, the only thing you'll really need a canister for is water movement, so you might be better of just buying a powerhead (like a koralia 3) rather than a new canister.
2) Definitely reasonable, add the rocks first and then the live sand so that your rocks are firm in their position, feel free to add 5 lbs of rock at a time after you have everything in the tank, so as not to over do it all at once.
You don't need sand though, there is much debate about the virtues of sand in the reef aquarium (personally, I think the more sand the better, but thats just me and just my thought, others will surely disagree).
3) I swear a prizm skimmer, made by red sea, ran my HEAVILY stocked 32 gallon very well and I would recomend it to anyone, this is a cheap skimmer, and it takes some dialling in, but once there, it's wonderful.
as another option I have been reading increasingly good things about the bubble magus nano skimmer, so have a look at that one as well.
4) no real difference, a reef tank can technically be a marine tank, marine just refers to the ocean aka salt water, the two major types of sw tanks you will see are reefs (coral, fish, liverock, inverts, etc) and fowler (Fish Only With LiveRock).
5) you came to the right place, I doubt there is very many questions that you will find that have not been answered, analyzed, argued about and answered again on this very site.
I love this book
http://www.amazon.com/Natural-Reef-A.../dp/1890087017
it got me started until I found this sight and started asking questions here, and I would recommend it to anyone getting into the hobby.