i’ll just be happy with a clean sound that’s audiable and that people won’t switch off
Good choice.
Most P-Popping and mouth errors go in front of your lips or downward, so if you can put the microphone in front or slightly high, you can avoid most of them. Note many home microphones come with little three-legged desk stands that put the microphone in the worst place possible.
Step one. Go into Windows and turn off all the processing, tools, filters, enhancements etc. Windows comes out of the box set for communications, chat and conferencing. Not theater.
What’s your studio like? Many people recoil at the “S” word, thinking a glassed-in booth with a control room and a recording engineer. Those are nice, but you can do really well with furniture moving quilts and plastic pipes. You can even do it on your kitchen table.
I applied Audiobook Mastering and your work passes the technical standards for ACX Acceptance. Boop. Just like that. You should be able to get rid of the room echoes with moving quilts (or Windows adjustments).
This can still go into the mud because the tools and effects interact, but so far, it’s looking good.
Koz