Quote Originally Posted by Melanie View Post
I'll go with skimask's recommendation...
WHOA! Did I read that right! Did Mel go with MY recommendation? (head swelling, I'll let you know when the pressure gets to be too much )
Learned all I can, I have...but a Jedi, I am not...

I'd say go with a PIC18F4550 and associated hardware, programmers, etc.
You can get it in a DIP package (which means you can mess with it on a solderless protoboard), it's got plenty of I/O and memory, plenty of functionality, and it's got USB ports...which, no, they aren't really for a beginner, but they are there for future toys.