Thank you for the input waterworks. I understand this may be time consuming and frustrating working my way through it from scratch, however this is a skill I am determined to master. I have spare time at work to struggle and make mistakes as I slowly learn how to build a proper WP site. I know about computers just not websites. Do you think this is something I can teach myself using the web, forums, etc- given enough time?
You mention that all sites are capable of customization, but does this require the knowledge of coding? If I understand you correctly, I could really take any theme out there that has a good base of options out of the box and modify the pages / columns / text to fit my sites purpose (assuming I can figure it out of course)?
The Ecommerce part will be solved through a web service that uses paypal integration (myflashstore) and they claim it is easy to imbed and use with WP sites. I am really only selling audio tracks, no physical products. myflashstore automates the entire process. Am I in for a big surprise trying to implement this type of store?
Where would you suggest I START learning how to put these things together besides just getting in there and doing it?