I've been a member for some time but have not been active.
I would like to know which distribution of Linux would be best for someone that just needs it mostly for email, surfing, and research (an alternative to windows but with like format if possible). I'm not into gaming or anything complex or needing a lot of power or complex graphics. Something easy to learn before I get into Linux in a big way. I'm not into tweeking or changing anything yet. I don't know enough to do that. Some variation of Ubuntu?
Any advice would be very much appreciated.

Given the usage you describe, I'd suggest Linux Mint. It's a nice, full-featured distro that goes out of its way to have its default menus etc. easy for new Linux users to navigate without insulting them by trying look like Windows. And it works really really well.

I've run it myself on various machines for several years and, when I set up Linux computers to give to my kids (who aren't kids any more), it's the distro I chose.

If you use the LQ Search to search for something like "best distro new user" you will find many threads on this topic; they may contain information you will find useful. A web search for a similar search string will turn up many articles and blog posts; some of them may even be useful.

Mint is the easier of the distros to get to work well on most any machine. But you need to decide which version of mint to use.
KDE is the all in one best of the group but it is also the heavy weight of the crowd, If you have a fast machine this will work well.
Cinnamon is also a good desktop that is less heavy and is good for a medium powered computer.
XFCE works well for the older slower machines, it is fast and lightweight and very usable.
All of the above are very stable and beautiful.

OpenSUSE 13.1 LTS ( long term support) or the short term 13.2

BUT

using KDE

Gmone3 is YUCK!!!!
just yucky


SUSE is VERY GUI centric

for most things it IS easier to use the graphical interface ( kde) than use the TEXT terminal

well documented ( except for the usa "restricted" formats -- software patents on multimedia )