Looking for some advice on getting started

agonizer, krea, gladiator titan (unless you already have one), and beast handlers. They are all the lifeblood of the Skorne army.

Stay away from cataphract until you are above 50pt lists.
The kitty squads are too expensive for a 25 or 35pt list, but something you'll greatly desire once you get into competitive list building (75pt lists).

Karax are our tarpit mainstay
Cyclops Shaman are always good.
Xerxis1 and Mak2 are good beginner casters and Morg2 is awesome for small scale battles.

You can do without swordsmen, but praetoran swordsman are extremely useful with their UA.

I consider the Adarus in the testing phase, but if you are having trouble dealing with ranged units, them plus a Krea will do a great job of handling them.

Since you are just starting out you probably don't want to consider character jacks, but Molik Karn will be a good addition when you break out of the 25pt limit.

If you ever take an interest in either Xerxis when you're getting to 75 points, look into Tiberion. Overtake on such a potent beast is extremely powerful. Moreover, his resistance to being moved around is useful in the current meta. Rhan's entire gameplan, Helios, Loki, Hellmouths (spell and unit), Telekinesis and the Bolt Thrower is just a small selection the things Tiberion can shrug off. That said, he's expensive, and often Sentries are taken as the discount version of him (without Immovable Object).