Before you can get started on your site, you'll need to transfer it to a computer that's permanently connected to the web, called a web server.

This service is known as 'hosting' and although many people tend use the space offered by their Internet Service Provider (the service they use to dial in to the Internet) there's no reason why they can't rent the space from other hosting services (or buy their own server if they've deep pockets).

It's important to chose your web host very carefully and be mindful of your needs. For a personal homespage, free web hosts like www.geocities.com and www.tripod.com are fine (so long as you can stand the flotilla of ghastly pop up ads and banner ads), but for a professional site you'll have to fork out for commercial website. Watch out for bandwidth restrictions too.

Ask around for recommendations (some hosts are definitely better than others) and check out the performance listings that you can find in many monthly internet magazines.

My recommendations are the very economical 1&1 Internet for home pages and small business sites and Netscalibur for larger, commercial sites.