Basically, so far the only miniatures I've played have been with pre made minis or have been using a friends army. The two suggestions I've gotten so far is either buy GW $15 starter book that comes with a marine and necron or try to find some cheep stuff off ebay.
Here is a love machine's not fuckin lazy guide to starting to paint.
1. Pick the faction you want to paint. Personally I would say pick what you actually think it's interesting, but generally loyalist marines are the simplest.
2. Pick a color scheme for you want to paint. The relevance of this matters to you and whatever game you're playing.
3. Pick up a basic box of infantry for whatever game you're playing. Sure one model is cheaper, but 5 to 10 will give you room to actually experiment and learn. You only get better by experimenting. If you want even more fodder, get a bag of plastic dinosaurs
4. Get the color of paints you need. Brand? Doesn't really matter, but try to get something branded for miniature or model painting. The amount of colors you need? I would watch some simple guides around your scheme. Want blue guys? Try an ultramarine guide etc etc.
5. Paint! Maybe watch a beginner guide etc. Just fuckin paint them.
6. Try asking around, see what people have to say about your first couple models.
Tools I HIGHLY recommend.
Brushes. A smol one, a medium one, and a larger one.
A hobby knife
Plastic and super glue
An army painter wet pallet.
If you give me something you actually want to paint, I'll can be more specific.
