My very first character was a Wood Elf called Tondon (a screenname I used at that time). I can't remember why I picked Bosmer. Might have been because it said they were good at archery.
Finding my way to the very first tower, right after "Unbound" started, was the most difficult task ever. Took me a
long time.
I arrived in Riverwood in the middle of the night, and the first thing I did was kill a chicken and a cow. Then I somehow ended up at Anise's cabin, explored her basement, and got killed by her spells. Had to try that fight a few times. Returned to Riverwood, only to get slaughtered by angry townsfolk.
When I finally progressed to the "Talk to the Jarl of Whiterun" objective, I blindly followed the quest marker. This led me across Nazeem's "
very successful business, obviously" farm, and to the city wall. I then spent a good fifteen minutes trying to scale the wall.
At some point I joined the Stormcloaks (I had followed Ralof
partly because I hadn't realized I had a choice, and so gotten the "Join the Stormcloak rebellion" misc quest), however I had absolutely no idea what the war was even about.
Skyrim was my first TES game, and I had zero knowledge of the lore (I didn't even know the lore existed).
I did NOT get launched into the orbit by a Giant, which is surprising. I did however try to get to Hjaalmarch by going through Labyrinthian (I still hadn't realized I had a map), at a low level and with crappy equipment. Can't remember if I ever actually got past all the trolls. One try included making a run for it, and leaving Lydia to the trolls.
I played on Novice for the first two months or so. I, too, tend to start new games at the easiest difficulty.