What shooting mode is best?

[Cullen]

Hi,

I'm getting a bit confused about which way is best to learn photography from scratch, regarding shooting modes.

I'm really new to photography and am still playing around with settings etc, but I've heard different things. Should I be using a manual setting straight up? Or should I be playing around and learning through the Av and Tv settings first, then 'upgrade' to the manual settings once I get a better handle of things. Or is it just personal preference?

I ask only because I guess I'm trying to find the most efficient way of learning how to get the exposure right as I'm pretty time constrained and really want to learn quickly.

Thanks all!