I just start with “It’s basically just a community owned Reddit” and leave it at that.
I think that gets the important point across. Getting into details about federation and picking servers just makes it sound complicated, when it really isn’t.
Then if someone’s interested I just recommend them a larger server and let them go from there.
I think people way over complicate things from the start and turn people off before they even try it.
I make it with milk instead of water and mix in some sugar and cinnamon. I don’t feel like that’s an excessive amount of condiments lol