North branch of the European XFEL, SASE1, produced first light on May 3rd, 2017, and XFEL operation has been gradually improved then. First characterization of the photon beam has been performed in July / August 2017, just before an official starting date of user experiments (September 1st, 2017). Energy of the electron beam was 14 GeV, bunch charge was 500 pC, photon energy was 9.3 keV. With photon diagnostics available at that time (X-ray gas monitor (XGM) and FEL imager) we measured the gain curve and traced evolution of the FEL radiation mode along the undulator. An important conclusion is that experimental results demonstrate reasonable agreement with baseline parameters. Developed techniques of the photon beam characterization also provided solid base for identification of the problems and means for improving SASE FEL tuning and operation.