(my) website help

So, I am looking to start up my own website. Right from the start, with purchasing my domain name, and going on from there.

Anybody qualified to help (or just have an opinion, no matter how wrong? lol)?

I'm looking for somewhere to host my website, somewhere that won't cost me a ridiculous amount of dollars, but that still gives me some essential services. Also, I either need to buy a cheap editor (cheap in expense, not in quality) to design my own site (which i have never really done before, so that route could be 'interesting'), or I need my host to offer services for design as well. I am looking of something not TOO simplistic in a website, yet not to hard to keep up with and understand, either.

I have heard rumours that, after owning your own domain name, choosing a host is the next most important part of the process. Apparently there are a lot of fly-by-night companies out there, and although they sound good, if the company folds two years from now, my website will fold along with them, and THAT i DON'T want.

So, any suggestions for me?

Not an expert but I went with wordpress for AFC. Free. You can get your domain name if you want. Design is from a series of pre-packaged options, or you can buy CSS options. Don't see wordpress as a flyby night. I'd recommend them to anyone. But you need to say what your site is for anyone to be able to answer. If it's a fanfic site then you're good to stay on blogspot.

Nah, I'm kinda done with blogspot. In the old days, you could go into the code and change how things looked. I loved to learn how to do little tweaks of things that way; nowadays, you can't get into the code to change nothin'.

As Rob says, Wordpress is pretty customizable and easy to use.

Domain-wise either GoDaddy or One.com have been pretty decent to me in the past. I know Ben uses FatCow for this site.

Thnx Phil and Rob, I shall keep all this in mind.