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In your situation I would not do drop bars. You will find that you will be less comfortable with your vision from the riding position with drop bars as opposed to flat bars. In the bike segment you're looking at, you should be able to find an equal bike with flat bars as opposed to drop bars. I actually have switched to a flat bar road bike after years of drop bars and feel unquestionable safer in traffic. Don't get me wrong, I love drop bar bikes but since I ride a lot less than I used to, I find myself more comfortable with flat bars. That said, you will give up some sprinting power and some aero efficiency on descent.
The best piece of advice in this thread so far is to test ride bikes. Different brands fit differently. I have never found a good fit with Specialized or Kona MTB's, but Rocky Mountain and Norco have been awesome for me. Same with Trek road bikes ... great fit.
As for the discussion in this thread about clips, I view them as a must have. You get so much more pedaling efficiency and waste less energy that they are worth the hassle of learning. I have zero problem snapping my feet out of clips in an instant ... it's simply a learned behaviour. I even use egg beaters on my MTB as I prefer not giving up all of my pedaling efficiency but need the ability to ride flats on descents.
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