web environment

I've been a programmer professionally for about 6 years. I've done some vb6, I've learned some html and am now taking on C++ net and vb.net . I have no experience with asp, xml. Or much of anything in a server environment. I'm interested in creating a personal web page as a learning experience, but have no access to a server in my home. In the Studio net environment it gives you an option to work offline, but my radio button is greyed out. I have a version of front page somewhere, do I need to install it to use the file extension? Would some kind sole out there tell me how to create an environment on my harddrive to create a web page that I can eventually migrate to a host? Thank you in advance. cjs