AC3D was pleasant for me. It was familiar to me after having played with 3DS Max and Maya a bit. The interface is nowhere near as cluttered and complex as Blender. It's probably not as advanced/fancy as Maya or 3DS Max, though.
I'm also doomed to use Blender when it comes to animation rigging. xD; But I don't really do it much.

I believe my very first 3D program was a simple program called 3D Canvas. It was free and had an easy tutorial on how to make a whale.