So 45 years old, always wanted to but never had the time, but would like to learn to play the guitar. My teenage son haa an acoustic and an electric guitar which he never uses so i thought I could spend some time and learn.

So what’s the best way to start learning given I have no idea how to tune a guitar successfully! I certainly am up for getting lessons but prior to that it would be good to learn the basics. In this modern age I imagine there are numerous Youtube and websites but It would be good to get some advice on where to start.

Not looking to become any sort of guitar hero, just would be fantastic to be learn some tunes, albeit it will take some time.

YouTube and some ‘learn the basics’ books.
Work out the chord shapes, practise loads until muscle memory takes over.
Play along to favourite music/songs, lots and lots of times!
Seriously, practise is your friend here.
Oh, and learn read TAB. No point trying too read music, unless you really want to!

I’m lucky in that I had piano lessons from 5, went to a choir school and have grade 8 in a couple of instruments. So when I came to learn guitar at 15, it was relatively easy. I still put in a lot of hours!

Find a ‘real life’ teacher, but for on-line stuff, you won’t go wrong following Justin Sandercoe’s beginners’ course:

http://www.justinguitar.com/en/BC-000-BeginnersCourse.php

It’s really, really good.

As tillydog says, you won’t get much better than Justin’s beginner course.

I had about six months worth of lessons, coming from the same place as you (had to look up how to tune it).

Started getting OK and learning songs etc, but I got bored eventually. I may start up again, but I would get at least a few lessons.

My reasoning was that I didn’t want to start with any bad habits.

MTB addiction took over (along with taking all my money too).

What sort of music do you want to play.

Get lessons with a good teacher, set goals and practice every day. Even if it’s only for 5 mins

Find a good teacher means finding one that will also teach you to play songs you are interested in. This will help keep you interested.

Practice some more, learn more songs you like etc.. have fun! Enjoy it.

Hal Leonard do some good books, there are plenty of online sites now – Justin guitar, licklibrary etc. But if you’re serious about wanting to learn, lessons will really help. They will also help you with discipline as you’ll have homework 😉

Get a teacher. A good teacher can teach you the basics in 3 months by which time you should know the basics. Once you’ve mastered bar chords, then you’ve cleared the point at which most people give up. I reckon 1 lesson every two weeks and practice every day. 10 minutes everyday is much better than 1 hour once a week. Set yourself a few goals. Choose a couple of songs you would like to learn to play. Tell your teacher what your goals are and what songs you would like to learn, and they can tell you whether they are obtainable easily and tailor the tuition to suit. You’ll be surprised how basic a lot of well known songs are.
Once you’ve got the basics covered then you should know enough to be able to play for the rest of your life. With that basic knowledge you will be able to start to tutor yourself, but sticking with a teacher will speed up your learning and help to prevent you developing bad habits.
There is a lot of help online, and tablature exists for almost everything. You can be taught to sight read tablature in 5 minutes. Online tutors are great, but they can’t correct your bad habits as they can’t see you.
Get a guitar tuning app on your phone and once you’ve learnt how to tune your guitar, check your tuning every time you play.