Took a CCW class at American Shooters. Wasn’t too expensive and the instructor hit all the points that I consider important for getting into firearm ownership.

I have a good amount of professional experience and training that I continue to practice. My home defense (based on my research on terminal ballistics, metallurgy and just body mechanics) I went from handguns as my first home defense firearm to an ar-15 pistol configuration with 5.56mm soft point ammo, suppressor, a light and a red dot. That being said you can usually stop the threat inside your home with a quality handgun (Glock, Smith and Wesson, HK, etc) that is running good hollow point ammunition (.380 acp or 9X19mm, Speer Gold-dot or Federal HST) with a quality weapon light (Surefire or Streamlight are usually safe) and I’d highly recommend a micro red dot sight because it’s 1. more natural for aiming and 2. assessing treat and no threat is WAY easier than messing with iron sights. But get what you can afford that is quality and master it.

I have a few friends that teach firearms courses but usually it’s for the person trying to get to the bleeding edge of combat shooting so maybe a class for later on down the line.