Yeah, the whole Bitcoin thing is a little daunting. I actually mine, so I had a little supply on hand, and what I didn't have for my order I was able to buy from a friend.

My friend buys and sells all of his BTC (shorthand for Bitcoins) at: https://www.bitstamp.net/ <- lots of transactions both selling and buying so I would say they are very safe

Alternatively, I have also used: https://btc-e.com/ <- not as many transactions and they have a limit on what you can withdraw at one time (a minimum of 0.10) but still seemed pretty safe to me. This site actually allows you to do all the crypto coins so it does have a better variety, whereas the bitstamp above is for BTC only.

I would have probably went with money order or the western union route if I was unable to use the BTC. Unfortunately, I'm like a kid in a candy store since most of the smoke we get around here is brown brick dirt and I just didn't want to wait the extra week or so the mail would add to the ordering process.