Don't start with the Maemo SDK, this is far too complicated and powerful for starting programming with python. You don't need it. Just get your python-code working on your machine, copy it to your device and try it there.

And yes, what you want to do is quite difficult for an absolute beginner. If you want to learn to program you have to invest some time. I'd say it will take 10-20 hours to learn the basics of a programming language (syntax etc.). But to apply these on a working program with a graphical user interface and UNDERSTAND what youre doing will probably take 100-200 hours at least.

So if you want to get a new interesting and challanging hobby, start with it. If you just want to make some cool app as fast as possible you probably are on the wrong way.