The strongest theory for the formation of the Moon says that a Mars-sized asteroid impacted the early Earth about 5 billion years, back when the whole solar system was still taking shape. This impact ripped of a lot of the Earth's material, throwing it into space. Some fell back to the earth, some escaped Earth's gravity, and the rest formed the Moon, and supposedly an orbit much closer to the Earth than today. (I heard 200,000 miles closer than now.)
Well, when the asteroid impacted the early Earth, I think the crust and a lot of mantle material mostly from one side of the planet. That left an imbalance. The side without the crust cooled faster and sank. While the crust insulated the other side, in fact heat built up. This sinking on side started pulling apart the other side, and continental drift began. (See the Earth page and continental drift, the geologic carbon cycle, and stable climate for reasons on why continental drift is important.)
Mars and Venus don't have moons formed in this fashion. Mars cooled evenly on all side, so has no continental drive. Venus has a even crustal cap on the whole planet. (Some experts say it's a thick crust; while others says it's thin. The data is ambiguous on this point. Both sides agree it's uniform.) IIRC, the crust is also relatively young. I'm not sure how many data points we have, or how representative of the planet in general they are, but I'm going to make a leap here and follow some expert's-whose-name-I-forgot conclusion and think the planet experienced a massive, geologically rapid, planet-wide crustal overturn. That also suggests no continental drift.
Some have said the life began in tidal pools, or along shore affected by tides. One reason for thinking this occurred in tidal pools is that the resources starting life were too dispersed in the environment in general. However, in tidal pools, the material is washed in on the waves during high tide, then the water dries up some during low tide, concentrating the material. Then more material delivered during the next high tide, and so on, concentrating the material thick enough to start life. I'm told the days were only 6 hours long back them. That's means a new high time every 3 hours. With the Moon so much closer, its gravity would have produced higher tides. I'm guessing that pools at the high tide zone didn't fully dry out before the next high tide and its waves refilled it.
The tidal zone seems like the best place for life to begin growing. After all, that is where the stromatolite grow even today.