I have sewed for many years with my mom's 1950 Singer 15-91(It's in a cabinet.). It worked for sewing anything I wanted it to do. But then I wanted a travel machine for taking to classes and bought a new small portable machine - it had fancy stitches, so after playing around with them then I decided I wanted a machine that could do more. Then I bought my Janome with the table it fits into (it is not a traveling machine) and I learned more things and found I wanted an embroidery machine. Out the gate, get what you can afford. If you already have a basic machine then I highly recommend buying a machine from a dealer that will be able to teach you all the extras you can do with your machine.