Another couple notes:
Even as a player from the American Region in game, you can meet in International Districts with players from any other Region.
As Dauntless said, play whatever class you are most interested in. We have a lot of members and the game also has a NPC Henchmen feature that allows you to fill out a balanced team when needed.
With a new account you get 4 character slots. You can create roll playing or PvP only characters in each of these slots. Additional slots are available for purchase. If you add a new chapter to your account, you will get 2 more slots for each chapter. One word of advice. If you think you might be at all interested in PvP once you have had a chance to unlock a few things, remember to leave one of your slots open for a PvP only character that you can delete and re-build as needed. The advantage of the PvP slot is that that character will always be max level and have whatever armor and weapon type you select and use any upgrades and skills you have unlocked to your account.
I suppose I should explain unlocking too. Each time your character learns a new skill, it will be unlocked for your account. Using identification kits on dropped armor (dropped armor is never equipable, all armor must be obtained from collectors or armor merchants) or weapons that have an upgrade applied (always on drops with colored lettering) will also unlock those upgrades for your account. Unlocked skills and upgrades can be used on any new PvP character you create. There are a few basic templates available, even if you haven't unlocked the skills, but the more you unlock, the more options you will have.
My character names are below (2 accounts). When you log in, your friends list is default mapped to the "N" key. You only need to add one character name per account and the friends list will show your friend no matter what character they are logged in as.