The best place to start is with your dad's classical music collection :D. Track down some late-Baroque/early-Classical stuff (Vivaldi, Scarlatti, Mozart, Haydn, the various Bach boys) and give it a listen, looking for stylistic trends that suit you or that grab your interest. If you're not already familiar with classical theory, whether you choose to learn it in depth or not is your choice. The more focussed neo-classical players have a solid grounding in theory, but there's nothing stopping you from learning Paganini passages by ear and improvising variations on them in your music. :)