As I am currently working as a web programmer for an university web portal, I can give you some tips. Mind you, I'm not a web designer, but I work in a very close contact with one so I picked a lot of things, at least in theory.
1. Try to find some CMS (Content Management System) that fits your needs. The idea is so transparent I even wrote a primitive CMS for my homepage before even knowing what a CMS is!
(I'm pretty sure what you are using is your hoster's CMS web-interface).
The basic idea is to separate content and the way it is represented (the page layout and style). This way you can do a complete rehaul of your website by only changing the "template" -- the thing that describes how your content will be presented.
Take, for example, a look at my homepage:
http://www.chebmaster.narod.ru/ Each page, in its source form consists of its middle part with two commands "include header" and "include footer" at the respective ends. The header and footer are two single files, so I only have to change them once and then press the "Compile" button in the program that does all the dirty work to completely change my homepage design. The same goes for the side menu. The header contains command "include local submenu if found" and there are exactly one side menu file per section of the website. I only have to change it once and it reflects on all pages.
This is a primitive, home-made CMS and still it's immensely useful.
Then, there are such systems as Joomla (yeeech
) based on php that literally compose the web page on the fly from the fragments you provided.
The bottom line: never start a website lagrer than a few pages without basing it on some CMS or other. Without a CMS any massive change you'll need later turns into a tremendous chore. With CMS it's a breeze.
P.S. Let's look at
http://ranma-fanfics.mikata.ru/ . It does not (or to be correct did not) use a CMS but it uses such thing as "virtual includes', which are very similar to php includes. When you view a page, the web server takes that page (which, in fact is just the center column framed with include directives at the top and the bottom) and inserts the header, the side menu (s) and the footer, from separate files composing the final page on the fly. Note that the style and position of the center column is ruled by the code in the header and footer (two files per whole site).
It's the same principle of separating content from the rules of its visual representation.
P.P.S CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is a much older mechanism based on the same principle, if severely limited. You define the styles (fonts, colors, page elements width and height, background pictures used et cetera) in one .css file per site, then link all your pages to it. I have to only edit a couple lines in
my .css, for example, and then upload it, to make my entire home page white on black background.
These things are relatively simple and
totally worth the effort of learning the basics.
2. Try to find a pro web designer and have him look at your site. After you pick yourself together from feeling as an utterly useless failure and your design a horrifying mess of fundamental, inexcusable blunders... You'll have to start from the scratch. Believe me, it hurts. Been there, done that. But at least it doesn't kill you (read: it makes you stronger) and is (probably) worth the pain