Just my 2 cents comment on your project :

As Mysql lacks 'row lock' (only 'table lock') you must expect serious performance penalty
when inserting/selecting/deleting a lot at the same time...
(Mysql is much more efficient with few update and a lot of selects..)

Anyway you could use our monastery Super Search which will bring you post like :
Perl/DBI (MySQL) tutorial which is a good start...
Or this one for interesting external links...

"Only Bad Coders Code Badly In Perl" (OBC2BIP)