...but it has a start menu. It's just tiled instead of a list. Also, how did you navigate Win 7 and Vista? You weren't typing you were doing it wrong!
Start8 is shit. It runs a lot slower than the Modern UI and is completely unnecessary.
MSE is still as good as it is before and yes it's built in.
Quick tips: Win + X = power user menu
Win + C = charms- restart/shutdown, quick access to the system screen, and a few other things
Win + W = settings search
Win + Q = app search, this view shows you all of your apps rather than the ones pinned to the start menu