majordude,
It's going to be difficult to bring you up to speed from 1982 without writing a book. Heck, it would be hard to bring you up to speed from last year because of all the advancements in R/C gear. It seems that major advances are happening almost daily. Jason just bought a radio that talks to him and tells him the voltage of his flight pack in the airplane while he is flying.
Just know that radios have gotten better, components have gotten smaller, and everything has gotten cheaper. Pretty much all servos are compatible with any system. Hi-Tec servos are all the rage in our area and just a few years ago they were considered unreliable. Now they are about the best.
Don't purchase any 72mhz stuff. 2.4ghz is more dependable and there is less worry (none, I would say) about interference. I would recommend Spektrum due to the availability of the small bind and fly models that can be converted for RCRG use. I am flying everything from micro-lite to 40% scale airplanes with Spektrum and I flew Futaba for 40 years
Tactic from Great Planes also has come out with their "Tx ready" micro stuff and prices are low on these as well as the Tx's to fly them. JR and Spektrum Tx's and Rx's are compatible. Every other manufacturer is pretty much exclusive.
There is a lot to digest. Feel free to ask specific questions. There are a lot of smart folks here and I'm willing to try to answer them too.
By the way, Kraft and Cannon are both out of business.