Baking is the worst place to start for a beginner, because it reauires more precision in ingredient quantity and technique. There's little room for error.
Whereas with cooking a simple dish like pasta or rice, you have more leeway with quantities and cooking times and preparation. And wayy more room for error. You can easily experiment with more/less of ingredients because it won't affect the overall dish and flavour much.
Whereas with baking, dough for example is hell. You need an almost astronomical precision unless you want to glue your entire kitchen, or make it too runny, or too floury. Baking also becomes more difficult wihout measurement devices, whereas with cooking trusting something loose like a cup or just eyeballing isn't catastrophic.