As an absolute beginner you should start by learning all the basic, major chords, concentrating on your finger positions and memorizing what the chords look like. After you have done this you can start exercising moving smoothly from one chord to another, starting off with simple patterns (like D, A, E) or whatever. When you have mastered this somewhat, I would suggest listening and trying to mimic different rhythms and strumming techniques, but having someone actually SHOW this to you is still best by far. I feel that this would be the best place to start off with, it will improve your skills greatly and it would keep you busy for about 3 - 4 months ;)
As for scales, back in black and sweet home alabama - scales, modes and soloing techniques are definately not where you as a beginner should start, nor are the songs. REM's "everybody hurts" is a great, simple song with a simple picking rhythm for instance. Or rather pick any popular song with a basic major chord rhythm. You'll be surprized how stupidly basic 90% of these songs are.