Help! I fried my starter....nOOb....

Hi Matt,
So the car kept running after you took the key out?
What's up with that?
The first thing I would do is pull the starter and "bench test" it.
Look at the drive gears and such.
Put it firmly to or on something. It will kick just a little.
Use the jumper cables to see if it still seems good.
Use the car battery.
Ground to case, hot to big terminal and small hot jumper to the solenoid.
If the starter is still good, then people can deal with other issues.