I'm returning!

[Raeve]

Hello!
I'm just now returning to FFXI, I didn't really have time to give it a chance before because hwne it came out here in europe WoW came out shortly after, and since all my friends were playing that I hopped on the bandwagon.
I've grown tired of WoW, actually I did a long time ago, but now I'd like to give ffxi another shot.
But I'm thinking of a few things, such as what city to start in and what race to play.

Main races I'm thinking between are Hume and Elvaan, I think I'm going to go for melee mostly but I'm thinking I like to keep as many doors open as possible.
Do I really get ahead as an elvaan over hume in melee, or does noone really care about race at higher levels as in most mmorpgs?
And I'm thinking of probably starting in windurst since I really liked that city the last time, but I'd really just prefer any city that wasn't dead empty.

Any help is appreciated, thanks!