In 1980 I drove a 1971 Dodge Colt, my father and I were running errands, he pulled into a empty commercial subdivision, parked half way up a hill and set the parking brake.
He asked me if I wanted to drive, I said yes, I had driven ride on lawn mowers, neighborhood kids go carts, mini bikes and a couple of 125 dirt bikes. I was ready.
The car was a wheezy 4 cyl with a 4 speed manual. He told me to get in the drivers seat and to go.
He set me up for failure. It was impossible to get that car going forward up the hill with little coaching. To this day I have no idea why he set me up for failure like that.
That was my first attempt at driving a real car.
My now 24 year old son had a much more pleasant experience. I took him to a large empty parking lot at 12 years old and let him drive my 2003 Mini Cooper JCW around the lot. He got the hang of the clutch pretty quick but he did not like how "squishy" the car was. He has a lot of seat time in racing karts at that point.
My younger son is 13 and going to turn 14 now, a little less mature than the older guy, I have a 1981 320i on its way to me, I really wanted his first car drive to be my 1978 Mini I just have too much to do to it, I think the 320 may be his first car drive.
He also has a decent amount of racing kart time. Not as much as the older one.