What is a good video editer?

I’m looking to create a video for a friend of mine who is moving. I have windows xp and I’m wanting to find a good video editor that will help me. I’d prefer it to be free and easy to use. I’d also like to find an encoder that will allow me to edit some divx files that I currently have on my computer. I tried windows movie editor but i cant import my divx files and edit them. any help is greatly appreciated. I’ve never done any video editing before so a easy , fun, free program is a great idea. thanks in advance