If you are contemplating designing your own website, the very first thing you’ll want to know is what the basic tools are that you would typically use to do this kind of work efficiently.
 

These are:
 
1.  A computer with a decent amount of memory, CPU speed and a high-speed internet connection

Because we all hate when our computers take forever to do something.

 
2.  A program to create and edit web pages in

Technically, you can use anything that can make a text file – even Notepad.  But in practice, you want a program that is designed to do this kind of work, such as Dreamweaver or some other such program.  The biggest reasons are because 1) they usually allow you to be able to preview how your page will look as you work on it, and 2) because they are designed to be familiar with the code you are entering and are able to spot mistakes in your code that you might have missed.

 
3.  A program that allows you to create and edit images

The image types you will be using are .GIF, .JPG (aka JPEG), and .PNG. Those are the image types that are web-friendly.  A typical program for this kind of work is Fireworks, by Adobe, but there are plenty of others. 

A note about image size: Just because you CAN resize an image with HTML tags (width and height) doesn’t mean you SHOULD.  It is the lazy way to do it.  If you take an image on your camera, load it into your image program and change it in there to the size you want, and then upload it to your site.  That way your images don’t take forever to load for your site visitors.

 
4.  An FTP Program (FTP = File Transfer Protocol)

You will use this to upload your pages, images, etc to the web server where your website is to be hosted.  Sometimes the program you use to edit the web pages has this functionality built in.  I personally use a free and very reliable FTP program called Filezilla.

 
5.  Several different browsers installed on your computer

Web sites don’t always look the same in every browser, and sometimes you have to tweak the code to make it look uniform in each one.  Minimally you’ll want to have Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari installed, but there can even be variations among different version releases of the same browser.  Be aware of this factor.

 
6.  At least a basic familiarity with HTML and CSS

Lots of places you can get this.  Just a few great resources you can use to get started are: www.echoecho.com has some great tutorials to familiarize you with the very basics of HTML and CSS.  It's free, simple and comes with great little quizzes for each section.  Another great site is www.lynda.com.  This you will need a subscription for (I am not affiliated with them, FYI, just a customer), but there are tons of very well organized video lesson courses on there.  One monthly subscription gives you unlimited access.  And they have lessons for far more than just web design.
 

Of course, if you are using a special ready-made website service, like GoDaddy’s Website Tonight or Intuit Websites, you might not need some of the above.  But for standard web design, the above list is the minimum you will need.
 
Once you acquire all the items in #'s 1-5 above(and become familiar with how to use them), I recommend having them all open on your computer at the same time before you get to work, because you’re going to be flipping back and forth between them a lot once you get your web design rhythm going!