The extracts below are saying that XHTML is for special XML functions and is NOT a replacement for HTML. HTML 4.01 should be used now and HTML 5.0 is coming in due course, so stiick to HTML.
Try to learn HTML and CSS from online tutorials like http://www.w3schools.com/ (they converted a lot of their site to XHTML 1.0 a few years ago when we all thought XHTML was going to replace HTML, but we were all wrong so try to learn from the HTML bits of the site).
Draft Recommendation October 2008
http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current-work/ asks for comments
and this needs studying in detail:-
HTML 5
A vocabulary and associated APIs for HTML and XHTML
Editor's Draft October 2008
http://www.w3.org/html/wg/html5/
Extracts:-
There are various concrete syntaxes that can be used to transmit resources that use this abstract language, two of which are defined in this specification.
The first such concrete syntax is "HTML5". This is the format recommended for most authors. It is compatible with all legacy Web browsers. If a document is transmitted with the MIME type text/html, then it will be processed as an "HTML5" document by Web browsers.
The second concrete syntax uses XML, and is known as "XHTML5". When a document is transmitted with an XML MIME type, such as application/xhtml+xml, then it is processed by an XML processor by Web browsers, and treated as an "XHTML5" document. Authors are reminded that the processing for XML and HTML differs; in particular, even minor syntax errors will prevent an XML document from being rendered fully, whereas they would be ignored in the "HTML5" syntax.
Extracts:-
This specification is intended to replace XHTML 1.0 as the normative definition of the XML serialization of the HTML vocabulary. [XHTML10]
While this specification updates the semantics and requirements of the vocabulary defined by XHTML Modularization 1.1 and used by XHTML 1.1, it does not attempt to provide a replacement for the modularization scheme defined and used by those (and other) specifications, and therefore cannot be considered a complete replacement for them. [XHTMLMOD] [XHTML11]
Thus, authors and implementors who do not need such a modularization scheme can consider this specification [HTML 5.0] a replacement for XHTML 1.x, but those who do need such a mechanism are encouraged to continue using the XHTML 1.1 line of specifications.
Code downloaded to my PC will be deleted in due course.
WIN7; IE9, Firefox, Opera, Chrome and Safari for Windows; screen resolution usually 1366*768.
Also IE6 on W98 with 800*600 and IE8 on Vista 1440*900.