First things first. The simple setup process:

Go to http://www.wordpress.org and download the current version of Wordpress. There are 2 versions, .zip and .tar.gz. I recommend downloading the .zip file as it is a bit more common.

The easiest way I've found is to simply upload the .zip file to your website's public_html folder. From there, you can access the .zip file in your cPanel's File Manager and extract the file's contents. If you don't know how to do this, you can simply unzip the file locally on your computer and then upload everything to your website. You'll have to decide where you want the blog to be on your website: If you want it to be in the root part of your website (www.domain.com), move the wordpress files out of the wordpress folder to the public_html folder. Otherwise, you can rename the wordpress folder on your server to whatever you want the blog to be (for example, if you rename the folder to "blog", your blog will be at: www.domain.com/blog).

You should definitely be using some type of ftp program, I like to use SmartFTP, but there are many other very good programs as well. This makes it very easy to upload all the files you'll need (including themes and plugins later).

Once you have all of the extracted files uploaded to your website, you'll need to create a mySQL database. This is another process that is done through cPanel. If you can access your cPanel, click on the MySQL Databases Logo. From there, create a database by giving it a name in the box next to Create Database and then hit that button. Then you need to create a user and give that user a password. (Make sure you note down the database name, user name and password as you will need this information later). The last thing you'll have to do is add the user you created to the database. In the Add Users to Your Database section, select the user and database from the drop down fields (also note here that cPanel adds the cPanel user name in front of the database name as well as the user name, this is what you'll need to enter later [for example: cpaneluser_dbname]). Once you've selected the user name and database, hit the Add User to Database Button.

If you don't have access to your site's back end, contact your server company or site administrator and have them create the database for you.

Ok, now you need to locate the wp-config-sample.php file and rename it to wp-config.php (removing the "-sample" part of the file name). Then edit it using any simple text program like Notepad. Fill in your mySQL database info and save the file. (There are notes in the files that explain where to put the information). If you downloaded the file to make the changes, upload it back to your site.

Some server companies will have ways of setting up Wordpress blogs for you (like using Fantastico - see video below) which make this process even simpler. However, I prefer to always do the install myself, manually. The reason for this is that the server companies do not necessarily always have the most recent updated version of Wordpress, and I like to have complete control of my site. If you are not concerned with this, you can check with your server company and have them set up the blog for you.

Now go to your internet browser and go to the part of your website where you installed wordpress (www.domain.com or www.domain.com/[whatever you named the folder]) and this will redirect you to the install page. From there, fill in some simple information about your blog and hit the install button. Wordpres will set you up with a user name (which is always admin) and a random password. Make sure you note down the password so you can log in to the back end of your Wordpress installation. If, for some reason you do not write down the password or lose it, wordpress will send an email to the address you provided during the install - so make sure you have access to that email account.

Now that your blog is set up, you'll want to log in to your admin panel and make some basic changes. The first thing I always change is the password. I change it to something I can remember, so that I don't have to try and remember some random letters and numbers. You can also change your user name to something other than admin if you prefer. You can make these changes by going to the User menu, which will show the registered users, and edit the admin user.

Another change you'll want to make is the blog's Tagline. Click on the Options menu and change the Tagline to give a brief description of your website. Also, since wordpress version 2.3 came out, it does automatic redirects to either www. or non-www. so that if someone types in www.domain.com or just domain.com into their browser, it will redirect to one or the other. This is important for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) purposes. So, you should decide which one you want and make the change here in the WordPress address (URL): and Blog address (URL): fields.

Alright, that's it for now, I'll be building more hubs later giving some great tips and tricks for setting up your blog to have it fully optimized for both search engines and users.