moving wordpress.com blog to my own domain

In order to have full rein of plugin installations and customization of theme templates, etc. you’ll need a “self-hosted” WordPress site which is supported via www.ads-software.com. If this is the route you would like to take, I could give you some pointers.

Yes thats definitely what I want. I only have done 2 posts on the wordpress.com page (still not sure of the difference between .com and .org but thats ok). I assume I’ll have to start over on .org then, right? I haven’t advertised the blog to anyone so I could just copy/paste the posts I’ve done already to the .org site if necessary

Read this and make an informed decision – https://en.support.wordpress.com/com-vs-org/

I want to go with the .org and host it myself. I guess that means I lose what I have already but I can just start over. I’m using this blog as a way to teach myself how to use WordPress, install themes, and upkeep a site so I can eventually offer WordPress services to my clients. So just a regular install then? Is there one set of directions for it that are nice and detailed so I can be sure to not screw anything up? ??

I did it! however I managed to screw something up after all (ha). My blog shows up when this URL is used: https://primaldesigner.net/wp/ but not when its just primaldesigner.net. How can I switch that?

take a look at https://www.ads-software.com/support/topic/should-i-install-in-root-directory-or-subdirectory?replies=7#post-1455011

You don’t need to lose what you already have. In your .com blog go to tools and export. Select “all” and download the xml file to your desktop. You can import your stuff back into your self-hosted site, under tools, import.