Hey guys,
I've decided to delve into the world of trying to edit meshes and textures for fallout instead of making player homes now but i dont know what programs i need
to edit the meshes and textures, can anyone link me to the programs i will need you have a rookies thanks much appreciated.

scottmack

The most common seems to be http://www.blender.org/ to create models, where you should use the older version 2.49b.
Together with http://sourceforge.net/projects/niftools/files/blender_nif_scripts/ which requires the Blender version mentioned before.
Nif Scripts also requires Python 2.6.6 and PyFFI 2.1.9, links are in the readme.

For Textures you can use http://www.gimp.org/ or anything similar, like Photoshop if you got the money.