Actually, there are several theories of time (the Rainbow universe being one) that posit that time has no beginning so there would be no first.
Indeed you are right about that, RIghtwardHo.
But if there is no "first" in time, then "how can anything be what it is, and not some other way?" Or even, how explain that "anything is at all, why not nothing at all?"
These are Leibniz's two great questions. To ask them has become unfashionable in our progressive times.
The "eternal universe" model has many supporters across many intellectual disciplines, philosophic, scientific, and theological. Yet ultimately, as an accurate description of the real universe, it seems to suffer from profound logical defects.
The first of which should be obvious: There is no human being on the face of this planet, now or ever, who has ever had the power of perspective that would enable him to see the universe in its temporal totality. [Only God sees that way.]
I assert that "temporality" is a condition into which a human being is born, in midstream, or "in the middle" of an historical process, as it were. As such, he is part and participant of the very process which he purports to observe. Therefore, he is no "sovereign" observer, occupying some Archimedean point outside the universe, for he is already wholly captured by it. The logic of his "position" breaks down entirely right there.
Not only does does this "observer" not see the "before" and the "after" of his personal existence; but there is no logical way for him to claim any privileged insight into the workings of the All of which he is a mere part and participant in time.
One cannot evade such questions by simply proclaiming the Eternal Universe model. Which I daresay is what the various "progressive" enthusiasts are proposing....
But finally, such a conclusion flies in the face of common sense, and human experience. So there must be something "wrong" with it....