travelpro,
My advice is keep things simple for yourself. Cathedral is a perfectly good dive. You can see a map of the area and the dive sites by looking up Anilao dive sites on the internet.(
Phil-Scuba or
Outrigger, for example). The diving areas toward the open water are more likely to have pelagics. The areas around the top of the peninsula have some great hard and soft corals and reef fish. Some of the better dives IMO are Kirby's Rock, Arthur's, Twin Rocks, and Beatrice.
If you are going for the day, the resort won't be too expensive (they'll have a day fee). Normally, people rent bancas and boatmen to take them to the sites. That gets pretty expensive for one person (boats run from 2000-5000 pesos for a full day's diving, depending on how far away the sites are), but you could find a group to join.
If you want to try a different resort than your friends, have the driver take you there and pick you up. These resorts are not necessarily anywhere near each other.
I wouldn't worry too much about going to the cheapest place, I would worry about getting to the best dive sites. Having said that, some of these resorts have room rates over $100 US a night, and probably charge for similarly for diving. All the ones I've checked have websites, so you can price them out for yourself.
Good luck with your diving.
Regards,
Bob