After circling around it for weeks, looking at every other option I could find, I finally decided that ReactJS has what I want to carry me forward for the next few projects, possibly years if it goes as well as I think. I fell in love with JSX the moment I saw it, we shoulda been using that long long ago, it's very intuitive. All of React seems very intuitive, which is what I have always loved about JavaScript.
Found this nice series of videos at Laracasts, very well done, just my speed. A good place to dig in and see how React coding happens.
"While Laracasts is dedicated to PHP and Laravel, the reality is that most of us need to write JavaScript daily as well. In this series, we'll learn about React - not the PHP version, but the JavaScript library, from the folks at Facebook. I think you'll love it!"
https://laracasts.com/series/do-you-react
Okay a little later, and I've found another intro. Again, quite good. This one goes rapidly, so even though both are intro, I would put this one at a little more advanced.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S66rHpyU-Eg
Lastly, my first actual coded app was this demo from c-sharp corner. That's me in the comments giving a bunch of tweaks on how to make it work, which was a good learning experience.