Doyce talks about starting power levels... and I think I mentioned something about this today, but I like his perspective. I think he's right that people like to go through the experience of acquiring new abilities, proficiencies, what not... and I think Randy's right in that there's definitely something about playing the character you intend to play from the beginning.
Is there a middle ground?
It turns out that I tend to design characters so that advancement is fairly superfluous. I have points that I could add to Jelica, but except for buying off her flaws, it's just making her a little better in game terms to what she is... or it's adding a new dimension. But that's because I had a full-fledged version of Jelica in my head.
I love starting new, but I also love starting in such a way that I'm not an expert at something. My character, Santiago, in the Mechwarrior Game to End All Mechwarrior Games didn't have any really special abilities. He had a mean stick, I suppose. He could sing karaoke. I don't think he had anything necessarily practical. (Certainly nothing I rolled on the dice actually worked.)
This might also explain my encouraging my players against points. "Just build the character you want to play." I'll mess with the characters' personal lives, but their point value is mostly for reference.