FWIW, it used to be more important to pick laptops based on available ports. With the USB-C standard, that's usually no longer a concern since you'd likely use an external hub to connect all your peripherals so that you do a plug-once.

If you plan to use it without external monitor for a while, that should really influence how big of a screen you should go for. The smaller 13.3" ones might seem nice and portable, but can be uncomfortable if that's your primary monitor for extended time periods.

A lot of laptop models these days make it difficult to add RAM, so I'd suggest you go big right from the start - 8GB minimum, 16GB recommended.

With regard to drivers, HP started using "universal" drivers many years ago which have minimum viable support for old models. They make drivers for newer models which allow you to access specific features, but the "universal" ones will generally work for older equipment.