I agree with the comments here. Don't limit your choices, read up and try as many as you can before going for one. It also depends on what you want it for and what sort of desk top you are used to using. I came from Windows and personally found the two mentioned here, Ubuntu and Fedora quite confusing as I was looking for things where I was used to seeing them. There are a lot of windows types of Distros around to chose from. There is no real need to learn the terminal, because most of the time you won't use it. If you want to do it then just do a live install and play around as it won't cause any undo-able problems -perhaps you are trying to run before you can walk. It is up to you, but for what it is worth I'd follow the advice on here, I did that when I started and before hand and that is why I am more confident in what I do now
