As others have said, we all need to start somewhere! The most basic requirement for owning a computer these days is a good anti-virus programme but you must make sure you keep it up to date. Norton Anti-virus is a good example of a reliable anti-virus product. You must make sure you keep your Operating System up-to-date via
http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com If you don't do these things, you are leaving your computer vulnerable to viruses, spyware and other kinds of attacks. If you have broadband, you must also have a firewall.
www.kerio.com has a very good free firewall but it is rather too complex to beginners. Sygate, Norton, McAfee and others make reasonably priced firewall products which are easier to use.
You don't need any software beyond Notepad (click on Start then click on Run, type notepad and click OK to load it, or find it from your Start menu) to create a Web site! You will need to learn how to write code but it's very, very easy. Applications like Macromedia Dreamweaver or Microsoft Frontpage allow you to create content in the same way you would if you were writing something in Word and let you drag and drop images into your page without having to know how to use code to set width, font, colours, et al. If you're serious about Web page creation and care about making your site compatible with any Operating System and Web browser then you should learn how to code.
These sites offer some help:
http://www.w3schools.com/default.asp
http://www.cookwood.com/html5ed/examples/
http://www.cookwood.com/html4_4e/
http://www.blooberry.com/indexdot/html/
Microsoft's Office site has some good tutorials and templates:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/training/default.aspx
...and it's always worth typing, for example, "Microsoft Word tutorial" into
www.google.com
As for copying and pasting, you can also do it via CTRL+C for copy and CTRL+V for paste. CTRL+X is cut but it's better not to use it until you've got the hang of copying and pasting! CTRL+Z is undo - it's a life saver! Many applications allow you to undo multiple times whereas some only let you undo the last thing you did.
Windows and Office have some really good built in help guides if you use Windows XP in the case of Windows. Search for the glossary of Windows Keyboard Shortcuts to find just about everything you need to know about cutting down the number of mouse miles
For technical help with your Operating System and other Microsoft products, go to
http://support.microsoft.com - it tells you how to deal with error messages like illegal operations and the dreaded blue screen o' death.
ATB,
- Lisa
