Hi and Welcome to the forum and Bass Buzz!
Ok, I was in a position just like yours a year or so ago. I had a cheap ibanez bass and the more and more I got into bass, the more and more I wanted a fender p bass.
Eventually, because I know what I’m like, I got a Mexican P bass and started playing it to death.
So you’d think that’d be it, yeah?
Yeah, it doesn’t seem to work like that for me…
So I then started playing around with Jazz basses
(you can see where this is going )
I ended up getting more and more basses and absolutely loving them all.
But here’s the thing I noticed - the more basses I got, the more it helped me identify what sound and type of bass that I like. I couldn’t do it by just playing about with 1 or 2.
Obviously, my bank manager is having kittens now at my credit card, but however you manage to do it, I think playing loads of basses is a really good idea. It really helps you find what you’re after - and you’ll know instantly when you get one and just go, “ah, this is the one - this is the sound and feel I’m after” and now I end up playing 2 specific basses - one that I recently bought and yup, you guessed it, the original Mexican P bass.
As for the active / passive thing - I find for me personally, that it completely depends on the scene - if I’m at home noodling about - I’ll pick up the passive mexican p bass. But if I’m jamming with my friends in the studio, I’ll take the new active p bass down, so I have the option if I want to, to boost it to cut through and be able to be heard. But to be fair, I normally leave it on passive anyway, unless it’s a specific type of music where I need to go active - it’s just nice to have the option. But again, best advice I can give is to experience every possible bass that you can, however you can to give you an idea of how they’re all subtly different.
The only battle I have left to fight is resisting going down the Stingray path, and @T_dub is really not helping me with this