Not a silly question at all
Hi,
You should be aware that the 16F877 is old, it has been replaced by the 877A that is slightly different but it is more or less the same PIC. But if you start from scratch and a few cents more or less makes no difference I would suggest a 18F4555 (it has usb if you want to try later on) or 18F4620 which is more or less a supercharged 16F877. More RAM more ROM and a lot more gizmos and gadgets inside for later use.
The letters after -P -PT and so on are what package they are in. For beginners -P is a good option. It is a standard hole-mounted package and will fit into lab-boards and similar. The others are surface mounted and are not suitable for lab use at all.
All this -P and -PT stuff can be found in the end of the datasheet for the PIC. You will need this datasheet so download it and save it.
Go for the 18-series and you will not be limited in either codespace or speed in the near future :-)
/me
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