I've had the wonderful experience lately of helping to organize and catalog the cellars of wine friends who have decades of experience collecting lovely wines.

As I handled beautiful older bottles that one usually only reads about, I grew curious: What advice would an experienced collector give to a wine lover just beginning to assemble a collection?

Surprisingly, I got similar advice from every person I asked.

The No. 1 bit of advice was not to worry too much about putting together a cellar when you begin to love wine. When you are just getting started is the time to try and try and try. If you can swing it, buy several bottles at a time to compare and contrast. If you know you like cabernet sauvignon, buy cabs from a handful of places and compare. Shop at various price points.

Make lists and notes of what you love enough to buy by the case and what you'd never try again. Allow yourself room to enjoy the exploration and the thrill of chasing flavors.

Once you figure out what you love, be a student of that wine. Read about the area. Visit. Learn the best producers and the best vintages. Knowing about the wineries and the place will deepen your enjoyment of each bottle.

Develop a relationship with a wine shop or distributor. Allow them to help you find wines and be your advocate. If you love wines that are hard to find or are from small producers, this may be the best way to find gems.

Be sentimental. Buy a case of that wine from your anniversary trip to Italy or from a fun tour in Napa. Half the fun is pulling out one of those bottles for friends and sharing the experience - even if they aren't your most amazing bottles.

Speaking of sentimental, buy wines made in years that have particular meaning for you, perhaps your anniversary or the year of your child's birth. Even if the wine isn't fantastic, the connection is special.

Use your cellar for entertaining, and always have some drinkable wines handy that you can open for friends without disturbing your ultra-special bottles that need to age for 10 years. Part of the cellar should be just for fun.

Buy some wines that need aging. You just can't match the experience of pulling out a bottle you bought a decade ago that has evolved and changed. I'll share more about which wines age best and how to store them in the next column.

Finally, if you are building a cellar, it will fill up fast. You'll always wish you had more space rather than less.