Updating from MacOS 10.7.5 on early 2011 MacBook Pro

High Sierra is the most modern version I’ve been able to tolerate right now. The problem with Mojave is APFS isn’t optional (even on a spinning drive) so you end up using a filesystem that’s not designed for the drive it’s being forced on. If you still find a way to opt out, Apple won’t provide system updates. You either become an APFS user against your will or you won’t get updates.

Stick to High Sierra for the time being. It’s not much less feature rich then Mojave anyway, so you aren’t losing much. I got my installer from the dosdude1 patcher. Mojave sits on my drive uninstalled since I grabbed it thinking I may do it sooner then I thought I would initially. I don’t think so - at least until Apple realizes that APFS is not for spinning drives and these should default to MacOS Extended (Journaled) AND provide a easy APFS opt-out for those of us who do not want it.