Using hardware now is like using a land line with a rotary phone to make phone calls... It's pretty outdated to use hardware unless it's a unique or live instrument. Also if you use Hardware, you end up with a lot of complications in terms of recording your music into digital format, and you'll likely lose the things you create because hardware can easily get lost, stolen, reset, etc... Hardware interfaces are nothing like modern software interfaces now, so you'll also be learning a lot of stuff, but not stuff that allows you to jump into the modern world of music production.

If you are just starting out, in my opinion, the best way to get into working things out is to just dive deep into a software based music DAW, you can try Garage Band or Fruity Loops, which have a slightly lower learning curve than other tools, there are also tons of tutorials on youtube. Ableton is a bit overdone and technical as a starting point, but then again, most valuable skills don't have very easy entry/starting points in life.