how to use Joomla! on a '.com' website

If you are using a web hosting service which has fantastico auto installer. You can install joomla to any website within seconds. I am currently using a web hosting service from www.hostkite.com . I have no problem at all. There are many cheap web hosting services. Hostkite.com is one of them (only $ 1.99 per month)

Yes, it is possible to use Joomla! on a .com website, if you are hosting the website yourself. However, if you are using a free blogging platform service like blogger.com or wordpress.com, then it isn't possible. However, I use drupal myself, and not joomla, so I am not sure how exactly you would put it up on your hosting account, but I have had experience on how to host it on a local webserver. But I believe that you will have to first download the joomla folder, and then download a FTP program. I use Filezilla. Link your website to the FTP program and then find your folder on your computer and drag the folder across to your hosting account. Extract all the files and then delete the folder, so that you have things on first level. After that, go to your URL and then follow the instructions there. Voila! Joomla is installed. If you have anymore questions, feel free to add me as a friend and PM me. :)

It doesn't matter what your domain name is. You must, however, choose a hosting company that has servers that allow PHP and MySQL. Very few of these are free and those that are may have too many restrictions on size and bandwidth. I think that Joomla is not hard to set up once you understand clearly what you want to use if for and therefore what kind of user you are. It is software that is installed on your host's server, not on your PC. There is plenty of documentation, including a "Joomla for Absolute Beginners": http://docs.joomla.org/Beginners . It ought to be said, however, that if the available documentation makes no sense to you then you probably don't have a need for Joomla at present. Joomla is a Content Manager System. I think that the modules you would need to set up a forum will be found in the Extensions library under Communities & Groupware. Try searching for 'Forum' from the top level of the Extensions library. There are several Forum tools and add-ins listed.