This is an excellent time to learn about a module called YAPE::Regex::Explain. With it, you can do the following:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;
use YAPE::Regex::Explain;

my $regex_i_dont_understand = q~"([^"]*)"~;
print YAPE::Regex::Explain->new($regex_i_dont_understand)->explain;
__DATA__
output:
(?-imsx:"([^"]*)")

matches as follows:

NODE                     EXPLANATION
----------------------------------------------------------------------
(?-imsx:                 group, but do not capture (case-sensitive)
                         (with ^ and $ matching normally) (with . not
                         matching \n) (matching whitespace and #
                         normally):
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  "                        '"'
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  (                        group and capture to \1:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
    [^"]*                    any character except: '"' (0 or more
                             times (matching the most amount
                             possible))
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  )                        end of \1
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  "                        '"'
----------------------------------------------------------------------
)                        end of grouping
----------------------------------------------------------------------
[download]

Pretty nifty, eh? Now whenever you don't understand the way a particular regular expression works, just set $regex_i_dont_understand to it and it will explain it piece by piece.

Hope this helps.

antirice    
The first rule of Perl club is - use Perl
The ith rule of Perl club is - follow rule i - 1 for i > 1