My first step in Blender, my first question...

Hi blend-obs ,

You can get different pies in Blender, depending on what key you press and what you have set in your Edit > Preferences > Keymap.

Z gives you the Shading Pie Menu, that lets you choose between for instance a solid vanilla pie, or a half see-through jello pie, or...

Tilde, by default lets you choose how you want to look at your pie... from the front, or from above, or...

Don't worry, there is a lot to learn and you are not expected to understand and remember everything immediately.

Many things need time to sink in. You'll learn everything you want, be patient and practice a lot. Everything will make sense at some point.

Yeah don't worry, there's pie menu's all over the place, you'll get used to it and learn the difference as you go. And you can access the same menus via a couple of different ways, so the things you see in the pie menus are all over the UI in different places, as you progress you can pick your favorite most convenient way that works for you.