new, lost and clueless …

WordPress is ideal for a blog with lots of photos.

The learning curve with WP may seem steep at first for a total newcomer to web technologies, but if you’re willing to learn it does get easier as you get into it and the basic principles become second nature.

It might be worth registering at WordPress.com first and setting up a free blog there. The same software is hosted remotely for you so you don’t need to get into any admin stuff. You won’t get the total freedom of using the self hosted version, but it may be an easier way to ease yourself onto WordPress. You’ll be able to export your content and switch to the self-hosted version once you get the WP bug.

Thanks for the kind reply Numeeja,

Cheers ! Now that I know that WordPress is what I am after, I will jump in at the deep end and register to set up a free blog as you suggest.

I like the idea of being able to learn slowly and add things myself later… and I hope to crawl out of the blog baby creche and advance further up the internet learning curve as soon as possible.

I do have another question, well two actually: is there a way to write text so that it can’t be copy/pasted … or do you have to copyright it?
I don’t want my photo’s swiped so DEFINIATELY want to post them in a format that can’t be downloaded. I’m not certain how to achieve this though.. any suggestions?

I’m assuming you already have a blog? if so, do you have a link so I may take a look?

Thanks again for your helpful into.. I now dare to take the plunge into WordPress ??

Duh Numeeja, how thick am I ? exceedingly dense it seems…

The registration page asks for my “Blog Domain” and gives an empty box followed by “wordpress.com”

So I see that I need a Domain Name… a little Googling later I try several Domain Name sites and do a search on the name I want to use… … YES !it’s available (first hurdle conquered)

Now the second hurdle… there are a multitude of options that appear to go with a domain name, the bit that says this:

Other TLDs
.com .net .org .biz .info .us

ok, no clue what a “TLD” is, but looks like optional endings for the domain name… but how do they differ and what do they do? should I say yes to them all? or is that unnecessary?

or can I only choose the “com’ option because the “wordpress.com” box ends in ‘com” ? (yeah ouch, I did warn you I was slow)

Hubby says that if I don’t take them all then the others might be snapped up by others later and I will be too late.
Firstly I’m seriously wondering just how “famous” he thinks my blog will become, LOL I have no such delusions of grandeur and secondly he knows less about computers and the web than I do (yes that bad) so he really doesn’t have the first clue about how many zillions of people blog already anyway….but does he have a point?

I have been pestered by some friends that I should try and write some articles for publication and that some of my photos are of a good enough quality to sell… that’s the main reason why I’m wanting to stop the copy/paste possibilities on the photos especially.
These friends are the main reason I’m here in the first place…. failure is an option, but so is success, so hey why not? lets have a bash and then I can get excited when a visitor counter on my page gets into double digits LOL.

I do already realise that I’m pretty crap at this since I can’t even get past the Registration page without begging for assistance, but I’m also an optimist and hope you or someone else will take pity on me and help me out.

Thanks in advance for any kind replies… Kiwidutch

You don’t need to buy a domain name yet, WordPress.com will set up a subdomain of wordpress.com with the free service, so you can have your blog address at https://kiwidutch.wordpress.com.

have a look at the video here: https://support.wordpress.com/getting-started/

There’s lots of useful stuff on support.wordpress.com that should help you.

You won’t be able to easily prevent people stealing your text & images due to the nature of the web, however you can watermark your pics in your photo editing software before uploading them.

Hi numeeja,

I’ve been busy looking at all the videos and reading all the instructions in the links you gave me… thanks so much too for correcting the mess I made previously on the registration page with the domain name….

I’ve just made my first posts: https://kiwidutch.wordpress.com/

haven’t sorted out how to put in a link to this or another webpage yet (for nzedge.com) or how to add photos but I’m slowly working on figuring out how… first things first.
I have the rough style of page I want, but is there any way to change the background colour or do I need to go to a more advanced customised set up page for that kind of option first? (if so, yep I know I’m not ready for that yet) baby steps.

Cool bananas… I’m actually learning something and apart from an initial attack of nervous anticipation, to my surprise it didn’t involve any physical pain or mental anguish… there is hope for me yet ! LOL.

Thanks for your excellent help… it’s very much appreciated !!!

Looking good!

I have my own hosting so I don’t use the WordPress.com hosted service. With the free service you’re limited to the colours as defined in the theme, However there is an upgrade available for a small charge that would allow you to edit the css.