I just started and i need to know what the best party to start out with is

<font color="lawngreen" face="trebuchet MS"> Welcome to IW Zed [img]graemlins/wavey.gif[/img]
and there are lots of partys that you can pick up on the way [img]smile.gif[/img] but my favourite is:

Player Character
Minsc(Or Keldorn)
Mazzy(or Valygar)
Jan
Edwin
Viconia</font>

The first time I run through the game I had

PC Necromancer LN
Keldorn
Minsc
Jaheira
Anomen
Yoshimo to be changed with Imoen

I seem to be getting along fairly well with:
Me and Minsc (Rangers)
Jahira (use her bug spells often)
Jan (damn good at picking locks but low on hiding in shadow)
Nalia (good spell caster)
Aeria (good spell caster and cleric)

Well my first party is stil the most powerful and fun imo, it consists of

Me (Mage)
Viconia
Valygar
Keldorn
Jaheira
Yoshimo -> Imoen

There's one problem with this combo though; Viconia and Keldorn don't like each other. For the rest; it rocks [img]smile.gif[/img]

is it good to start a multiplayer game by yourself and create all your characters?

Thats what I did. I created a multiplayer game. My PC was a Skald(bard) and a secondary character, which was my original BG2 char, Morrow, fem Half-orc Wizard Slayer, lvl 33.

I tried using the skald, but really found no use for him. So deleted him and created a cavalier....male this time...gonna romance Vicy..

<font color="gold">...and if this is to work, you must have the Happy Group Scripts, downloadable from here. ;)

A good party IMO, is:

Protagonist (Kensai)
Keldorn
Minsc
Aerie (good romance-option)
Edwin
Yoshimo

(spoilers)
*
*
*
*
Now, when you read 'Yoshimo', you probably says to yourself:
"No, Sir Exxon is wrong here, as Yoshimo betrays and leaves you"
Well, perhaps so, but you can easily keep him using CTRL+Q... ;) </font>

<font color="lawngreen" face="trebuchet MS">You CAN do this though there is no character interaction :( But it is much more the characters that you want! </font>

I advice against creating your own party.Much of the fun in the game is the banter between characters.
@Sir Exxon
I think that with ToB installed you don'y need the happy script.