I started to learn the 8051s about one year ago, I was a really dumb, knew only to program in Delphi and use the parallel port. Knew nothing about microcontrollers, even what MOV does (really), just knew its could work independently of the computer after programmed, this was the why I became very interested.

I started with the tutorial I found here in 8052.com, could understand nothing at first read, at second I started to understand, before the end of third read I was playing with some codes and leds in outputs, I'm not any Pro today, but learning a lot, and people in this forum helped me a lot!

I choosen AT89S52 as my first microcontroller because it could be programmed serialy and without having to be removed from its board (ISP) also could find in a shop next here for something like 4USD, although, dont know if it is the best for start.