Okay, so I'm not quite sure that this is the right thread for this kind of post, but since you guys all seem fairly knowledgable, I figured I might as well.

I don't know the first thing about Dragon Ball, or anything related to it. If I wanted to watch it, where would I start? What is the difference between Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z? Did one come before the other?

I know some of you reading this post may have just cringed at the extreme noob-ness, but I promise it's motivated purely by a thirst for knowledge. :P