Okay, don't feel to frustrated.  Took me a while to figure out how to do this, and I'm not entirely sure I'm doing it right. :)  The first two steps are optional, btw.

The first thing I do is make sure everything falls under the Root of the character.  Some wardrobe and clothing will Fit To, but show up as a seperate item under the Scene Tab.  I drag and drop them to the Genesis figure.  If you do this right, you can collapse the character and everything hides away under the Gensis figure.

Second thing is I rename the figure and the props on it.  For example if I create a character I decide to name Fred, I change "Genesis" to "Fred".  If Fred has Valea's Pure Hair Punk, I rename "PH Punk" to "PH Punk Fred".

The Important Part:  Save As Scene Subset (File -> Save As -> Scene Subet).  You'll be asked to give a File Name (I usually save mine to a seperate folder), then asked what parts of the scene to save.  Uncheck everything but your character and items you want to load each time with it (step 2 makes this easier).

Note.  This will save the Items, Textures, Parameters, and Pose Info for the character, so consider using the neutral pose.  I also usually save the character in a full Scene file since I usually have a few lights, cameras and props (Such as Spyro's MWall Prop for sizing) that I don't want to have load every time I use the character, but want if I decide to go back and make a few changes.  I'll reload the full Scene, make changes and then resave the Scene and Scene Subset

From there you can catagorize them using the Content Library Tab and Work them into your Smart Content.