I see you got your answer, but I’m adding on for anyone else that comes across this.
For me, I learned the most when I had a disposable and replaceable system. When I was dual booted I was too scared to touch anything in case it fucked everything up. Once I started poking round on a Pi, LiveUSB, etc it was a lot easier to learn because I could always restart.
Id start there with something like Mint or Ubuntu. Then set it up in a way where you can easily replace your OS so you can reset it often and fuck around. Then just learn as you go.
A Windows VM running Windows terminal, SSH’d back into the host, obviously.
Honestly I stick with whatever the default is and never had a problem that led me to find anything else.