Like drawshot i am in the same boat.. newbie 45 yrs old.. read many reviews and you tube videos on which guitar to buy to start off with. the popular newbie guitar of choice seemed to be the Epiphone les paul special 2 i guess as a cheap($200) but decent starter. Went with that. it lasted 1 month i got the itch for something better. I felt from my research about $300 more($500-600 range guitar) you get into very good guitars, where your sound is better all around and you have more tone choices as well it closes the gap significantly on the big named custom guitars.

I went with the PRS SE standard 24. That is the newer cheapest line from PRS made in indonesia. Wow was I impressed. For $500 new it has to be best in class. check it out. It's a guitar you can grow with and good enough to take on stage imo.

now i need to just learn to play haha