I think this really depends on what use your program will be for.
I work in web development, so I had to learn most of the scripting languages when i studied programming. I started with HTML and worked myself up to CSS and javascript. Im starting my degree in college next year in computer science and maths, which from what i have learnt so far is mainly all based around actual server scripting such as SQL and soforth. But i know 100% that once you learn the very basics of HTML or even Visual Basics, that all other languages will just fall into place, once you have that initial conception of how the languages work and how to computer reads them.
But as said, select a language that is relevent to exactly what you wish to program for. Wether that be databases using mySQL and PHP or building websites using XHTML and CSS.
I hope my answer somewhat helped.
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