Climate zone?
Sun exposure?
Pot or in the ground?
Personal food preferences?
Annual or perennial?

My personal 3 favorites are rosemary, lavender, basil.

Rosemary and lavender are perrenials in the ground here but rosemary has to be grown as a summer annual as it's tropical.

Parsley, basil, thyme, mint... and Cilantro for the Salsas and Guacamole. All can be easily grown in pots. Seed the Cilantro in small batches in one-week intervals so you always have some.

Try starting with the easiest which should give you success and encourage future additions: Basil, Thyme, Mint (in a container or otherwise contained in your garden!) are all easy to start from seed. Other easy to grow herbs, at least in GA zone 7B, are Oregano, Chives, Sage, and Rosemary.

What herbs do you like to use? That should be more the deciding factor than what is popular. In zone 9 all the common stuff except those plants that like it cooler (cilantro, dill, chives, etc.) should grow very well for you.

FataMorgana

thx all.

be sure to buy good seeds and/or plants

Cilantro grows great here in the fall as well as dill and any root vegs, cole plants as well as any lettuce Garlic chives grow very well here, Also you just might want to find an ethnic grocery store in your area and look in the produce department for lemon grass. Here were we live are Feasta stores I bought 7 stalks for $1, just stuck them into my soil in out of the way places where it gone almost no attention except from mother nature,they all sprouted just fine. The 2 I placed in my herb bed are doing much better and will get to the place where it just might try to take over the herb bed in a few years. Rosemary and Greek oregano you should purchase from any box store as they will in a couple years become quite large, enough to where if you do not use it enough you might want to just start plants to give to your friends unless they already have them and in that case have them give you some cutting for rosemary or dig up a few roots from the Greek Oregano. I keep killing my thyme and chives but not the garlic chives they are very hardy. Have fun and enjoy the benefits of living in this zone.