Help me get into Shin megami tensei/persona

[Dioxinis]

OK! so i know theres like 14 thousand different shin megami tensei games and 4 personas and i've heard good things from the community here as well as other places but i dont know where to start o.o

i have a 60gb ps3 so i can play any games from ps1-ps3

 

i also have a psp if the new psp ones are a good place 

 

just anywhere i can start to get into the series a persona game? a devil summoner i just dont know

 

(btw im a stickler for story so if it is a sequel that relates to the older ones i'll probly want to play them first but thats not nessisarilly true in all cases if the story explains enough and your dont really need the sequal etc....)