If you've got a new computer you could also try The Witcher. The story is really good - if a bit on the European side - and the gameplay is not too complex for someone who's new to the genre - it also has an Oblivion-style feature of tracking quests down and literally pointing you out what to do next, where to go and who to talk to -, it's chapter based, so you don't have a huge world to wander and get lost in - you explore little pieces of it at a time (Oblivion can be a little puzzling in the beginning with its massive environment) and the graphics are really good, very artistic, maybe a bit too artistic, getting to be downright picturesque at times. But that's not a bad thing.

Also, if you say you've played a lot of action/FPS titles Bloodlines would be a good choice, were it not blighted by a great number of technical problems (they can be overcome with the patches that the community has developed over the years, but searching out for patches on the Internet and trying to get a game work right is not a very good start for someone who just wanna get into the RPG genre)