might look into Mandrake, its the version of Linux i've been using with Gnome as the interface
each person has their opinions and like different things, so you might just want to look around
http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/

also i believe Slackware is one of the oldest distributions out there, and quite a few ppl i know use it, thers also quite a few IRC chanels for discusion of the different copies of linux, just have to look around for them
http://www.slackware.com/

and of course... cant forget
http://www.linux.com/