I do know this: I already know and understand more than I did before. For years I've read published authors' remarks about how publication brings about a whole new set of problems. For the most part, at least in my memory, those authors remained rather vague about what those problems were. This is what I've learned so far . . .
Reading a contract and understanding what it means is a whole new skill set that can take quite a while. Working with a publisher and coming to terms is a delicate process, no matter how much you like each other. I am grateful for every moment of this process, not only because at the end of it we reached accord, but because I am better educated thanks to that process. I will always be grateful for what I now know.
In Songs of Innocence and Experience, William Blake explored the first two stages of a fully lived life. Though he indicated there is a third stage that follows the childlike phase of innocence and naivete, and the phase of experience and potential cynicism, he did not name the final stage. It blends innocent joy with knowledge. Perhaps it's Wisdom.
I am by no means a wise person, but I feel an inch or two closer to it than I was when my friend asked the question that opened this post. In my earlier innocence as a writer, I thought, BOOM, you signed the contract and all else followed as if a Fairy Godmother had bopped you on the head with her magic wand. Then, for many years, as I submitted my mss. and went through first one phase of acceptance ("Yes, we'd like to see your sample chapters . . . your synopsis . . . the whole manuscript.") only to end back where I started, I sometimes struggled with bitterness and yes, cynicism.
This small beginning, which is also huge for me, helps put those years of struggle into context. Every minute was part of my learning process, a process I am still in and will be in for the rest of my life as an author. Becoming an author involves writing, writing and more writing, learning to go through the submission process, learning how to read a contract, how to be both a writer and reader AND knowing that each experience is complete in itself and part of a greater process.
Don't know if that's any more coherent than what all those authors who are already published have to say, but it's where I am right now. Always beginning!