USB/HID Driver Tutorial and/or Sample Code desired

I have a prototype USB device that I was told is designed to be a HID compatible device.  (This device is still in pre-production, I received it from the hardware designer).  I was given no software, but I'm wondering if (and how) I can open the device and just "talk to it", so to speak.  

How can I detect it's insertion into the USB bus, and then be able to see what (if any) data it is sending and/or be able to send data to the device?

I'm looking for source code, a HID driver tutorial (on Windows), and/or a USB spy type utility.

A link to a good tutorial page that dives into this stuff will get an 'A' grade based upon 100 points.  If I get a reference to a free utility that I can just "use" to verify the device, I'll kick the points up to 200.  I'm willing to kick the points all the way up to 500 if I get clear/concise code I can build upon quickly.

Thanks in Advance,
Brad