Creating a category for special users

not sure if this is the right place to post this please let me know

I am looking to create a special category that only invited users can view on the store
how would i go about this?

for example i would like to be able to send an email to a list of  "leaders"
where they can then go and download special audio files after purchase
without making these files available for everyone to purchase

This kind of functionality is not available "out of the box". You will have to make some modifications to the code and database.

You can add a "group" column to the customer table.

Create your "special" category that only the "leaders" group can see

Modify the product display pages so that only products that the user is allowed to see are displayed.