What I did was buy an Arduino Nano clone - cheap from Amazon or Ebay (or you can chose an Uno but they cost more), download the Arduino IDE (free) and then try out the example files provided. Alternatively you could download circuito.io (which is also free) and use this simulation package. This does require some knowledge of C.
I bought an inexpensive kit with some sensors, DC motor, servo, LEDs, and such. Mine had a little booklet on getting started but there are lots of tutorials on the internet.
