If you really want to become good, follow Millenium's steps. In order of importance, HTML, CSS, Javascript, jQuery, PHP. And the site you posted is not that simple as you think it is.

So you want a quick simple website that doesn't look quick and simple?

It really depends on what you want to do. Google "content management system" and see if that gives you want you need, otherwise, start a blog at any one of a bazillion blog sites. Almost all of them have loads of customization with zero need to code. Content management systems can be a little more in-depth but even they shouldn't be that bad.  Anything you make yourself will look completely amateur, which isn't an insult, it's just because you are an amateur (well, not even that yet) and you're an amateur trying to make a website quick.

You can make something yourself from scratch but it's never going to look or work half as good as the website you linked to unless you actually invest a lot of time in becoming good at the various aspects needed. That website probably costs Big Cartel more than $10,000 to create and if you're actually looking for something with a shopping cart, that's just something you don't want to do yourself if you're not a professional. 

I'm not going to quote everyone, but thanks for all the help.

@Twestern, I realize the hipocritical nature of my goal :P But that's the reason I used that site as an example of 11/10 on what I need. I'd be glad for 6/10. And yeah, I'm staying the hell away from things like shopping carts, I'm not that crazy.

So, yeah, so far my plan is pretty much to follow Millenium's steps keeping in mind routsounmanman's suggested order, using some WYSIWYG editor as per NiKKoM to help experiment when I wander off from the tutorials (which I inevitably do a lot).

If it's possible I'll try to dodge writing php myself for anything that would actually go up as much I can for now, and try to be mindfull on the security side of things when I delve into it, so thanks for the heads-up ArnoldRimmer. Again, I have no pretentions of dealing with shopping carts or anything of the sort in the short term.

Even though it looks like I can get pretty nice results fast with them, I'm avoiding things like worpress or Dreamwaver since I do want to actually learn this.

Thanks guys, this really helped. I should get started tomorrow. If this works out I'll let you know.

Edit: Ohm if you have any further suggestion, please feel free to voice them :)

I have actually just started teaching myself how to make websites. 

HTML/CSS is actually pretty easy in my personal opinion.  Like others have said, if you want your site to be static (as in you won't be able to add content later blog style) you don't need to learn php.  I am going to teach myself some php, but the whole concept of dynamically injecting content into a site is going to be inherently more complicated that creating a static site.

I created my personal site in about 3 days (after a few weeks of learning).  I just used NotePad++ to get the job done. It's not the best but it was only the second time I had tried to make a site, and I'm damn proud that its completely made my me (save for some javascript plugins).  The only concern I have for my site is that I don't really know how to make it secure (though I don't know who would want to hack a personal website).  One of the reasons I am learning php is so that I can create a wordpress theme out of my site and use their security features.


I looked at your example site and I think if you're a complete beginner its going to take quite a while to get it working.  They have javascript running in there to get some of the visual effects.  I would learn HTML and CSS first as others have said.

If you need some help let me know and maybe I can help you getting it up faster. (unless this is like a lst minute school project thing you have to do on your own ha)  Why do you need to make this so fast?

Go to Wordpress.org and start there. Download the software, browse the templates, and then ask questions on the forums. If you're looking for fast and easy, it doesn't get any more so than Wordpress.

PS. Unless you have an eye for design aesthetics and spend months learning color theory/balance/user interfaces, your site will probably look like shit. Making something look effortless is bloody difficult and takes people years to master (and some never do). Coding a site is only part of the equation.

Wordpress templates. Get them. Learn them. Use them.