So I have occasionally had people ask me about learning how to make web pages, and had thought of putting together a guide. But to no-one's surprise, I'm sure, it turns out there are a bunch of good guides out there. This one looks like the best I've yet seen, starting from the very basics, getting into pretty advanced layouts, and using a proper emphasis on clean coding and separating content from presentation throughout.
My sister credits me as a "persuasive influence" (hey, it beats being called "bumptious") on the way she designs web pages, so until I get around to ranting coherently (the ranting is easy; the coherence part takes energy...) about the One True Path To Web Designing Enlightenment™, you can read her description of why you ought to use valid html and css to separate content from presentation.
If you really want, you can get really bleeding-edge fancy by checking out Eric Meyer's page. It served as the inspiration and template for the pure-css popup menus on this site. A list apart also has some good stuff on css-based layouts and standards-compliant web design. The style-sheet switching and cookie serving javascript on this site was pilfered shamelessly from this article.
Either way, when you get stuck, refer to the official standards for the final word. They also have links to validators, more tutorials, and all sorts of other good stuff.
