Ignorance is Bliss

So, for christmas dinner I made bread for the first time ever and fell
in love with yeast. It's the most amazing stuff and apparently I'm not
the only one who thinks so. The Joy of Cooking states, "If you have
never made yeast bread, behold one of the great dramas of the kitchen."
Boy, is that true. I had great success with my first batch over the
holiday and thought I'd whip up a couple of loves for a work party. So,
I put everything together and mixed and kneaded and kneaded and
kneaded, and set it in the bowl to let it proof and the first hour goes
by and nothing happens. I'm starting to panic a little 'cause I really
don't like it when things are not working out like they should. As I
wait for the dough to rise, I keep playing back the way I made it the
first time around. Yep, I scalded the milk, added the butter, salt and
sugar, beat 3 eggs and added, dissolved the yeast and waited for it to
become active, threw in the flour..., what did I do wrong? My love
affair with yeast is rapidly becoming a love/hate relationship as I
wait impatiently for the tell tale bubbles to start forming on top of
the dough. Did I kill the yeast? I consult Alton Brown's baking book
for clues as to what might be going wrong. Did he steer me in the wrong
direction? It's 1:30 in the morning and I'm going to take his advice
and put it in the fridge for the cold and slow method of proofing and
hope that something happens by the morning. I guess ignorance is bliss,
because I had no idea what I was doing the first time I tried this
whole bread thing and I ended up with big beautiful loaves of golden
brown braided egg bread... Well just have to wait and see...