what is ftp

I have got namo web editor, am learning PSP, have tons of webpage templates collected and thought now is the time to try and make a webpage (my ISP allows me a free one with 100Mb). Then I found this strange word coming up everywhere....... FTP ! Now I figured out it was a tool I needed to upload my pages to the web. But how ? I haven't a clue. I installed smart ftp and now I need help. I did a search on the internet to see if I could find a list/forum/group but there are just so many that I don't know where to start. So here I am... Can someone help me with the basics here ? is this the right kind of forum ? Or maybe recommend me some where else ? any help would be gratefully appreciated. At the moment I have a freeweb page but would like to do a bit better than that as it is very limiting.

cheers,
Joanne