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Tutorials are good, but I'm looking for something that will teach me how to use Poser by walking me through the process of creating my first real scene, from understanding the UI, to rendering the final image.  I'm hoping the manual will do that.

Yeah, uh, good luck with that...
If you're counting on that you're going to be very disappointed. While Poser's manual has improved over the years, it still remains... shall I say... lacking. It's, like, tradition or something.
But really, software manuals are typically vague and incomplete, so I can't say Poser's sucks any worse than your typical software manual.
What it does basically, is it explains - in minimal detail - every feature in Poser. I just spent some time reading through it for the first time in a long time, and have to say that I couldn't find many features that were explained enough in the manual to enable a n00b to actually create anything worthwhile. At best, it's good for reference, but that's about it. Mostly you'll learn about Poser by using it and asking specific questions. The manual is not your friend. It's more like an older sibling or a workmate who has been forced to accommodate you, but does so only grudgingly and sparingly.

It does explain the interface reasonably well, as well as the various options, but if you're looking for, say, how to set up good lighting - which is an absolute MUST in 3D, you're going to be SOL. Poser's lights kinda suck anyway (the source of almost all my Poser anxiety), but are usable if you understand how good 3D lighting is set up. Same thing with cameras. To take a good picture, you need to understand photography reasonably well. Poser's cameras do a decent job, but they don't do it for you, and the manual is pretty selfish with details.
For example (from the manual) - F-Stop: The F-Stop number represents a lens aperture size. The larger the number, the smaller the aperture opening. Each number is multiplied by a factor of approximately 1.4 as the scale rises, giving standard values of 1.0, 1.4, 2, 2.8, 4, 5.6, 8, 11, 16, 22, 32, etc. Each change either doubles or halves the amount of light transmitted by the lens to the film plane.

Seriously, what the hell does THAT mean? Nothing, really, to someone who doesn't know about photography....
And then there's rendering, too, which is a whole 'nother subject altogether. Raytracing, shadow mapping, and so on.

The people who make great Poser images using only Poser are able to do so because they implicitly understand these things about lights and cameras, and the technical aspects of rendering and surfacing/shading. Granted, alot of the Poser art you see is someone buying a bunch of premade figures with premade cameras and lights, and premade poses, and hitting the old render button, but someone had to make all that to begin with.

So the best thing you can do is just plunge right in, and  ask technical questions as you see a need to. There are alot of people here who do understand these things and will help... assuming they're not busy talking about their damn cats at the time, that is. ;-)

But if you want some "how to" books for Poser, I suppose they're out there. Better yet, find some books or tutorials on general photography and lighting and scene composition, preferably as to how it's done in 3D computer graphics. THAT is what will make you a good Poser artist... provided you can learn how to coerce Poser into cooperating, that is. Which, I might add, Poser does try to fight you every step of the way...