Cleaning An Estate Meer

First off, let me just get my jaw off the floor - our beloved Tom has a Meer!
Secondly, I have been told / have read that using alcohol on a Meerschaum is a definate no no. So as long as you are just cleaning the stem you are fine. The bowl in mine just gets wiped with a baby wipe afterwards and that's all the maintainence.
I hope it's a good smoker for you, and you post your impressions of it. I would ask for pictures, but Not only do I know better, if you did my heart might stop.

Can I soak the bowl in dishwashing liquid

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I don't know about that? I think just some hot water would be as far as I would go...

I see no problem with your plan except I don't understand the soaking of the bowl. Why? Cake? If there is cake, some gentle scrapping with a knife, round nose if available. No digging really just scrape lightly and gently until you expose meer, light brown, just colored mineral. And you should be good to go.
I'd sanitize the bit with alcohol soaked pipe cleaner, fill it, lean back and savor. Maybe some ghosting, I seriously doubt it, smoke through it would be my suggestion.

Enjoy!

Should be a nice first smoke Tom if it is anything like mine. You have the added advantage of knowing a proper cadence, so if I can do it I'm sure you will make it sing.

I leave the cake in mine and ream it every month, in my opinion you get faster coloring with a little cake, as for cleaning the outside, about every six months give it a wax bath and it will keep it shiny and bright. Congrats on your new acquisition as it will undoubtedly be the best smoking pipe you will own, been smoking meers for years and love mine.

I clean mine after each use with a doubled over pipe cleaner and once in a while I’ll rinse it out with hot water and ream it out real good with a paper towel. So really, I treat it like any other pipe. Hope you enjoy your meer. They’re nice to have. I’ll smoke mine exclusively for a week or more, then put it away for a week.

I clean my meers each Sunday with the rest of the pipes I've smoked the previous week. No cake needed nor wanted in my meerschaums so, they get a quick scrape in the bowl, down to meer. The stem/bit gets reamed until the cleaners come out clean. That's it. My newest meer is thirty-five plus years old and coloring nicely.
The routine is: After they are smoked they sit in an ashtray until the next night or Sunday. I irregularly rotate between eight meers, each pipes getting three or five smokes each night for one night or a couple of nights. There is no rhyme nor reason to selection each evening. One of the reasons I love meers is a pipe can go all day and next or, more and still proved a great smoke.
I've never had the original wax disappear, even after fifty years of hard use so, never had a reason to add wax. Mine are old pipes and perhaps manufacture methods differ now. I did go through the "wax aids in coloring" phase many years ago. Anecdotal evidence said I was simply adding wax and the color of the wax. But, that is anecdotal.
In winter, if house=bound, a meer might get eight or ten bowls smoked in a day if it's the first selected pipe in the morning. Meers for me are normally an in-the-house choice. Briars are smoked inside and out. Cobs are mostly during hard labor outside or fishing.

I must confess I love smoking some well known English Otc's with faint floral topping in my two meers, these like blends truly sing' when smoked in Meerschaums.

I'm a couple days late to this thread, but I actually posted a video on my YT channel today specifically about cleaning meerschaum pipes. You can find it here along with other informative meerschaum video's I've posted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77dqSPa3ceE
FYI... my intro is about a minute long so skip to 59 seconds if you want to skip the intro. Hope it helps going forward, and enjoy your new to you Meerschaum pipe.