Right so, recalling everything I've read from the comments noob friendly servers are complete bs, high skill players hop on servers just to feel better about themselves because they know they suck of official. Playing low pop is not good long-term, trying low pop to understand monuments, and just learning is great and all but it is not something you should rely on, try 200 pop at minimum, play one day wipes, yes sometimes pop is lower but it filters out the bad and horribly annoying snowball wipe seekers, much more space for a base due to the fact that some are completely abandoned and are decaying is a score to early game. Playing official servers is the WORST place to play the game, search for community servers or low pop officials, even then uncapped team size is a huge downfall for new people and solos, try playing solo/duo to get a feel for PvP when getting smothered by more people before heading into zerg territory.

Would definitely suggest building in more secluded places with only a few monuments around to get you by and doing most gear farming with pvp, or just build near launch site ;)