I had spent several years playing with Perl and like you didn't take the time to really develop a solid foundation in the language. I have lots of experience in other languages and didn't think I'd really need to read the docs. As a result of this thinking, I floundered. It would take 3-4 times as long to write anything. Finally, I realized that I needed to buckle down and go to square one. I signed up for a beginners training class, even though I had been using Perl for years. I read the Camel and re-read Mastering Regex for the Perl slant having read it without Perl sometime back.
Now, I get much more work done in less time and it's better Perl, not just how I might implement a C solution in Perl.
It really isn't a question of "can I afford to spend the time getting a good foundation in the language" as "I can't afford not to get a good foundation."

Good Luck in your efforts.
Cheers

Sweetblood