Looking for a welcoming, small-ish competitive group.

Hello, I've been playing Pokemon for about 9 years now, pretty much since DPPt. I used to be an anti-smogon noob back when I did not know better, but have had an itch to battle competitively over the past few years.
At this point, I have plenty of time to breed competitive Pokemon, but the main issue is I don't like facing people who I don't know, and as such shy away from battling randoms. And finding people locally who play Pokemon at any kind of level is sort of hard to do (my younger brother plays Pokemon but he could care less about doing anything with me, too busy with CS:GO/R6)
I don't mind learning competitive battling, but I'd be much more comfortable in a small, tight knit community that would be there to help me learn the ropes. Are there any communities you can direct me to?

If you are willing to use the simulator, the battle server can put you in touch with some people notably the Battle Server Staff who have experience playing this game competitively and would be more than willing to anyone out.

As Levea said, we're more than willing to help you learn and battle. We're a pretty friendly and small group of people.

Hop on the Battle Server sometime!