I would recommend the Nikkor 35mm f/1.8. This lens is faster than zooms that are four or five times the price and is the perfect focal length for general purpose photography.
Back in the film days, I learned photography on a Pentax K1000 with a 50mm fixed lens, and my first SLR was a Minolta XG-1 with a 45mm lens.
Many modern photographers have become 'zoom cripples' and will use the zoom ring to compose their pictures (including yours truly sometimes
). What they are really doing is 'cropping' the picture rather than moving around and changing the composition.