Vegan is ten times harder to do than vegetarianism. Bread even has dairy in it. Almost every restaurant you go to will have several vegetarian dishes( i guess depending on your area), but vegan meals are rare. I also think that right now the dairy substitutes are terrible, especially soy cheese. I would definitely cut the dairy out slowly transition into it. I am an ovo lacto vegetarian but I don't drink milk, eat ice cream, eggs (rarely), or butter, I do have cheese.
Pasta is good, and meals consisting of vegetarian meat likes worthington, gardenburger, and morningstar with your veggies are good meals too. My favorite meals are Amy's dinners, they are at most grocery stores I have been too. They have stuff like vegetarian meat loaf, soooo good. Good luck!