Little Head start help?

One thing a good programmer always has in his bag-o-tricks is a set of container classes. STL provides several of such container classes, but arguably they are not as well suited for games as they could be. In any case, writing some of your own is a good exercise. Try these out:

Array class (contiguous storage)
Linked-List class (build as you go storage)
Hash Table (keyed storage)
Stack - (first in, last out)
Queue - (first in, first out)

If you've got those down, try writing these simple games:

"Guess the number" - A random number is generated within a certain range, and the player has a certain number of attempts to guess it. Optionally, the program can inform the user if his or her number is higher or lower than the answer.

"Tic-tac-toe" - We all know how to play this. You don't need graphics to do this one either. Have a two player mode, and a single player mode with computer player AI.

"Wheel of Fortune" - Replicate a game of Wheel of Fortune. Again, no need for graphics. Make this one data driven - read all of the words the players guess from a file. Have a multiplayer and single player mode.

"Pong" - This one will need some graphics. You could use OpenGL or DirectX to accomplish this. If you opt for OpenGL (which I recommend for portability and ease of use just starting out), Use the GLUT library (GL utility library) to handle making a window in the OS and setting up the OpenGL context, as well as event handling.