Speaking as an absolute newb to this series (I bought AC+ two weeks ago and it's my first experience with GG), I find Ky to be a good practice character. I haven't given all the characters a try yet, but Ky's moves are all easy to perform and he has some easy chains that lend themselves to experimentation. I've spent hours in Training alone just trying out combos with him, and while I'm still terrible at this game, I can at least consistently beat the CPU in Normal now, compared to being beaten by it on Easy during my first week.
I think the hardest basic thing for me is air combos. No matter how many times I Dust or use a regular launcher, I have incredible trouble following up with a decent air combo. The best I've ever done with Ky is a 9-hitter, and it was insanely hard to do it again. I'm not even going to touch things like FRC and Instant Blocks until I've gotten a grasp over the basics. I figure once I get the timing down for the many, many chains for many characters and can do them from muscle memory alone, I can start focusing on the other stuff.
