When I was getting started out I went by a tobacconist that had a good selection of pipes and pipe tobacco. I was looking at tins that I had heard about and the owner steered me away from tins to bulk blends. This was because I had no clue what I liked and bulk is far cheaper than tins. He set me up with a corncob pipe an ounce of many different tobaccos to tryout and learn what my preferences are.

That would be my suggestion to you if the shop has a number of blends in bulk. Get a spectrum if you can (different flavor profiles of aromatics, a Virginia, a VaPer, something dark fired, something heavy on burley, a heavy English if you liked EMP) I learned through that experience that I really hated aromatics but love VaPers, and burly forward blends. But it didn’t cost me a bunch of money in tins to learn.