It cost me $25,000 US to put my son through college so he could learn programming. It could have cost me more, but he had a loan, a scholarship and he worked at a campus computer lab while earning his degree in computer science.
And you want someone to tell you 'the easy way'?
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Whiskey, women -- and astrophysics. Because sometimes a problem can't be solved with just whiskey and women.
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"Did you get my e-mail?" - "The biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place" - George Bernard Shaw, 1856
There are all kinds of on-line resources for learning programming; for example, my sister-in-law has her 11 year-old son using Scratch or something similar to learn basics of programming. There are some good on-line tutorials for learning to program PLC's, although eventually you need to work with the real hardware and software. Community colleges, PLC vendors and other sources are also available. You really need to begin with 'Where am I?' and 'Where do I want to go?' Then you can search for the tools and methods to get there.