New to wordpress – course of action?

So I have an existing site that I’ve cobbled together from limited HTML and CSS knowledge. I’m a designer, illustrator, photographer, etc. and the site is primarily a web portfolio.

I’m looking into modifying the landing page to include a wordpress blog for quick posts, in-progress shots, etc – Things that aren’t in the final portfolio part of the site.

I have a header / Nav bar that works works well enough and I’d like to keep it as is. I’d like the wordpress controlled stuff to slide in under that and be very minimal (1-2posts, navigation for older posts, and maybe tags) – no comments, calenders, etc.

being new to wordpress and kind of slow w/r/t/ web stuff in general, I thought I’d ask if this is a practical approach and if anyone has any general suggestions as I get going on this.

Thanks!