Been cooking since I was 12 to 14 years old slowly polishing my skills with more advanced recipes and skills. At the moment i'm starting to feel i've learned what I can on my own and want to know if anyone can offer up some advice. Love to try some more complex recipes, skill sets, knife handling, butchering techniques, etc... . So far i'll buy meat from the grocery store and butcher what's there myself such as buying a huge boneless pork loin then making boneless pork chops. The chops i'll sometimes butterfly putting homemade BBQ sauce on made from a tomato base cooking it on my infrared grill.

Another area i've dabbled in is slow cooking recipes having taco meatball appetizers (Party Poppers), Italian Chicken (Original recipe i've practiced for 10 to 12 years now), Slow cooked Pot Roast, and Home Made Chicken Noodle Soup to name a few.

As as the topic description suggest can anyone suggest some different things for me to try to polish my cooking skills? Haven't tried deserts and only know how to make Key Lime Pie and Strawberry Rum Topping for ice cream.

Not much of a help for you, but I've watched (on tv) a cook making ice cream with liquid nitrogen (? or some non toxic gas). It was pretty cool, of course, you can find liquid gas 'round the corner'...

buy a whole chicken and then de-bone it

Could give it a shot I guess never really butchered a whole chicken before. Mostly cooked em whole over 3 to 5 hrs in a herb butter mixture with onions on the sides for added flavor. I'll take the drippings from the chicken + herb butter and make it into a gravy serving it with either rolls or stuffing whatever works. Also pretty cool to take the chicken carcass and boil it to make stock then store it to make chicken soup.

Besides watching lots of cooking shows on TV? That's basically where I learn everything.

I cook a mean prime rib roast and chicken francese, Learned them from watching TV. I'm a big fan of Gordon Ramsay lately, but I've learned quite a bit from others like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tc9Eisi8ik0, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqBqiGM1O54 and old classics like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DLQ26zl19g (which is still my favorite cooking show of all time).

Seriously, besides actual cooking watching cooking shows is one of the best things you can do, unless you want to spend good money on classes - cooking classes always seem to be expensive.

You get butchering and slow cooking practice all in one.

I cook since I am a child as well, imitating father, mother, grand mother, grand father. I am french and from a pretty traditional family when it is cooking. I will say this is the best way to learn. As I am travelling a lot, I try to pick recipes from various places. One of my best discovery is the Yassa Chicken, which is a way of cooking chicken in Senegal.

You first take your chicken parts and remove the skin. bThen, for 1 full chicken, you add the juice of 2-3 lemons, 1 large spoon of french mustard, 2-3 big onions slices coarsely, 3 cloves of garlic, 1 crushed bay leave, 2 crushed cubes of Maggi, 1-2 hot chili peppers (habanero will do perfectly) and a bit of oil. You can add a bit of other spices but avoid too much.
Leave that marinate in the fridge for 12 hours.
Then you grill the chicken (bbq is perfect) for 10 min on each side. The aim is not to cook it inside but grill it. Then put in a pot, add the marinade, add a bit of water, salt. Leave it cook for an other 20-30 min. As simple as that. You will love it.

Try your hand at baking. Most cookery is very forgiving, you can mess around with the ingredients and amounts a bit, add things 'to taste, but it's been said many times, cookery is an art, baking is a science. Your measurements and timings must be exact. No room for error, it's a discipline. Master baking, and you can master any area of cooking. Might not sound as exciting as cutting up all that meat at first, but nothing like the smell and taste of your own cakes and bread.

[Edit : and kneading dough is a great stress reliever.]

If you read "A Game at Dinner", found in the Chorrol Mages Guild, you get +1 to cooking...wait, alchemy. That's kinda like cooking, right?