New to plants

[Jahindman]

Do I need to remove the base of the plant that it is shipped with 

[lefty o]

the little plastic pot they come in, you dont have to remove that. in a lot of cases the plants will thrive a little better out of the pot, but you for sure dont have to.

[Gail Kali]

No not the base or the root, if that’s what you mean. The base and the roots are what you are buying. The leaves melt off and then get new leaves. 

[Jahindman]

I was talking about the wool I just pulled the plants out and removed it 

[Widgets]

You can either leave the plants in the planter, and place it your tank.

You can remove the plant from the planter and carefully separate the rockwool from the roots.

Some plants will loose (melt) their leaves due to water parameter differences, or if they were originally grown above the water instead of underwater. Some like to wait for the leaves to adjust to the new water before adding stress to the roots by removing the rockwool.

[Beardedbillygoat1975]

Yes discard the wool. 

Depending on the plant you may just want to let it float and acclimate in your water before you plant - I like to do this with stems as they can readily absorb fertilizer from the water column. Sometimes you'll get new root growth and a stem will form new stems and some crown type plants will start runners.

With crypts I like to cut the majority of the leaves off - if there are new ones or they look fairly new I keep them - so that instead of putting energy into melting leaves it can focus on rooting and growing new adapted leaves to the tank. 

Swords you can plant right away. 

Rhizome plants (anubias, bucephelandra, bolbitis, java fern) you can put them on a rock or wood and just let them grow or let them float for a bit. As long as you don't plant the rhizome in the substrate they should do well unless you get rhizome rot and then there's very little to do.