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always start with what you know, yourself.

Make sure you back up your finding with facts, you want a family tree not a fantasy tree.

Your parents birth certs will probably be your starting points. It will give you their parent names if not already know, so you can get the marriage certs. And so on backwards

Irish research can be difficult esp Northern Ireland lots was destroyed in the uprising in the 1920's/ Dublin might be easier, but mine are Northern so no real knowledge of Eire. GRONI is the Irish website.

Be wary of trees that are online, not all are accurate. I've seen trees that have parents dying before their kids were born, kids dying before they was born and all sorts. And if you dare question the tree owner be prepared to be screamed at.

Name collectors are another thing to avoid if possible. When I first started mine I was SO thrilled to find some researching the same names, that I gladly let him see my tree. Only for him to lift it totally and add to his tree. His wife is very very distantly related to my OH grand father. He took the whole tree and I mean all of it not jsut the bits that were connected. He even has my ancestry on his tree. I always keep my living rellies hidden on my online tree, but on my private tree they are shown. But he just publishes his whole tree which of course includes living people. BUT he  didnt copy my tree quite quick enough, and didnt get my kids DOB. They are all on my tree in married name but was given that name in 2002 when we reregistered their births. He has them ALL down as born in 2002!!!!

But the main thing is be prepared to spend hours trying to get over a brink wall.

It's a very addictive hobby

Just looked at name collectors tree and he currently has 20,642 people in his tree.

And just to clarify I share 72 people with him where as I share just 5 with a direct rellie, Her grandparents were my gt grand parents!!!

Oh, this business really EATS time... I was lucky, someone from a different branch of the family did my paternal line back to someone called Athanasius who was married in 1737. Dad and I visited the hamlet where he lived, near Plymouth.  I've done quite a bit of fishing around my maternal line as well, and done some research for a friend, but it's very easy to go barking up the wrong tree (har - I had to say it!) with all the information out there. I'd like to do more and go back further - but there are only so many hours in the day, and there are costs attached to acquiring certificates, searching parish records and so forth - I'm in Wirral and the stuff I'd need is in Devon/Cornwall, and a bit in Scotland

Good luck with the research, but it will need time!