3-4 for me. Lele, Koko and Ninetails really trashed my team  
I noticed my team weakness on Friday and it was too late to train others so YOLO 
Welcome to the pokemon community. 
Pokemon is fairly easy to play all round. Dont worry bout that. 

Sun and Moon offers the same gaming experience mostly.
The notable differences are that there would be some minor version exclusive pokemons that you can only obtain in either sun or moon

Reference here --> Sun and Moon Exclusives

So for example, you can only find Vulpix in Sun while you can only find Sandshrew in Moon.

Just started not too long...am completely lost lol...and how do I add friends?
But dont fret much about it. If you get Sun (for example), you can still obtain the pokemons only in Moon via Trading with other players.
Thats what make pokemon fun. Capture, collect and trade.

Breeding and battling comes next, if you like to fight with players competitively. 

You can trade pokemon between players. 

You can trade with online players using the Festival Plaza
Battle and Trade reference below:
http://www.serebii.net/sunmoon/communication.shtml

You can get high level pokemons from other players, however the game mechanics has a counter for that abuse.
If a pokemon's level is too high compared to your game progress, it will not listen to ur instructions in battle.
Pokemon obedience reference:
http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Obedience

You can try wonder trade. Festival plaza on the.bottom screen, trade, choose wonder trade. You will randomly trade with other.people. never know what you'll get.