Some of the knowledge you acquire from one array lang can translate to the others, but the semantics are not 1:1 (ie. J is not just ASCII APL).
As it currently stands, I dabble in almost all the array langs, but of the ones I use, I think best in J. It's got a lot of convenience in it's large set of primitives, and there's no "indirection" between the character you want, and the one you type. Still, it's not without it's shortcomings.
I think I would probably still recommend BQN to most people looking to get into array programming, as it removes some warts in APL/J.
You lose some convenience functions (base conversion, fixed-point, etc) but you get a language which is more uniform and intuitive. And FWIW, I had the keymaps learned within the first day I started to play with it.
It's still a learning curve regardless of which lang you learn, but it will change how you think.
b. Why J, as opposed to another APL implementation? In particular, the different syntax, I suppose I mean.
Thanks!