Are cartoons the best place to start for a novice?

Start off drawing stick figures, then once you feel comfortable with that start adding bodies and bulkier legs, after you get that down pretty good convert the stick figure (circle) head to more of an oval shape, start drawing expressions, drawing ears, and drawing the nose. This is about a step before anime, start studying different anime such as inuyasha, naruto, or whatever. Look how male and female anime bodies differ, the male body is pretty much a square, a female body is more curved in, like a soft S with the end cut off. This is so important, DO NOT MISREAD THIS... Start copying other peoples artwork, use this ONLY to LEARN, taking credit for other people's artwork is pathetic, and shows no creativity whatsoever. After you feel good you have the anime body down, start drawing your own anime, it doesn't matter how bad it looks your learning. If you get to this point you've made it far. I could continue, but I'm only at this level, so my information may be misguided. I hope I helped.

~SB