Hi Tarzanna77
Yep definitely avoid Frontpage at all costs. it does weird things to your coding and design. I have heard that Site Spinner (
Virtual Mechanics SiteSpinner - Website Building Software) is good for beginners
I have just succumbed to the charms of Joomla for CMS. You can register on their site for a password to use their demo
Joomla! Failing that apparently Wordpress can be used for the same reason. Both have pre-made templates available to start you off.
As far as ecommerce goes, there are a few options available - I am currently creating a site using OSCommerce
http://oscommerce.org/ which has community support, should you get stuck.
Regardless if you need help or get stuck with any of the above, do feel free to ask this community.
Hope this helps.