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That said I still think a P-bass is as good a place to start as any, unless you already know you really specifically love a particular bass sound, in which case I figure there's no need to ask the question
Part of me thinks you should get a second pickup... I know there are problems with PJ layouts (the big ones are getting the outputs to match, and unless it's a noiseless J you get noise in 2 out of the 3 settings), but it does give you more options. There aren't usually that many other options at that price point for 2-pickup basses, at least two pickup basses where the neck pickup is a Precision pickup- I agree with you, the P-pickup is so useful it seems a shame not to get it as one of them!
I did start on guitar - but then so did many great bass players - but started playing bass early enough on that I hadn't really got a lot of technique set in stone. The really funny thing is that I play guitar almost exclusively with my fingers! For many years I did for bass too - until I started playing in a punk covers band. For the sounds you need for that, I had to learn to play bass with a pick .
I'm also in another band where I almost always play fretless without a pick. Does that make me more or less of a proper bass player than ones who only play fretted with their fingers? I also don't always use the alternating two-finger technique, except when I do use it. It's irrelevant - if you can play the music you want to play, it's all good.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
I definitely didn't start bass early enough- I was very much a "guitar player" by the time I started. And I almost always play guitar with a pick! But (after getting some advice online about what not to do if you're coming to it from guitar) I very deliberately tried to approach it as a bass player- I'm not saying I could pass as a bass player, but hopefully it's not too obvious that I'd rather be playing guitar!
That thing I said about the pick thing, about not being comfortable with a pick- you can often even see it in really good, professional bass players. You can tell they're not that dextrous with the pick. I'm talking about really, really good bass players, who are way better than me. Yet they look about as comfortable with a pick as a guitarist who's been playing for about 3 months!