Want to buy Bitcoin but honestly confused about the whole process - is it complicated or am I overthinking?

I've been putting off buying Bitcoin for like 3 months now because every time I try to research it I get overwhelmed. My friend tried explaining it to me but he started talking about private keys and hardware wallets and seed phrases and I just checked out. Is it actually that complicated or is he overcomplicating things? Like, can I just download an app, buy Bitcoin, and that's it? Or is there actually a bunch of technical stuff I need to understand first?
Also I keep seeing people argue about which platform to use and I have no idea how to choose. Coinbase seems to be the most popular but people say it's expensive. Kraken is cheaper but looks complicated. There's also Gemini, YouHodler, Binance (which I heard has legal issues?), and a bunch of others I've never heard of. The fee thing is also confusing. I saw someone say they paid 3% to buy Bitcoin and another person said they paid 0.1%. That's a huge difference. How do I know what I'm actually going to pay? And then there's the question of where to keep it after buying. Some people say leave it on the exchange, others say that's dangerous and you need a hardware wallet. But hardware wallets cost money and seem complicated to set up.

I'm not trying to be a crypto expert, I just want to buy like $500 worth of Bitcoin and see what happens. Does it really need to be this complicated or am I overthinking everything?