So im planning on building a small shopping cart application using simpleCart(js) for most of the work, but i want the actual shop items to come from a Database

Ive been looking for ages, but still a little stuck.
I want to make a new 'tab' on the dashboard screen
(which i can do fine)
but i then want to be able to have a "Add Item" and "Edit Items" options, which should save to a Database.

This kinda thing must be possible because its sort of how gallery plugins work, but i havent found anything that i can work with (without having to trawl through the source of an extension...)

anyone able to point me in the right direction? xx