Total Server Setup

Good afternoon,

I've read up on 'Perfect Server' setups. I've followed all the
tutorials on creating the perfect servers though in the end with no success.
I will list out what I am seeking to accomplish and if anyone could help or point me in the right direction, please let me know. I've searched in many
different places with no end result.

1. I want to host a private home web server.
2. I just registered 2 domain names: www.sebblucas.com & www.xpresalo.com
both registered @ www.netfirms.com.
3. The laptop has a 'Perfect Server' setup of Ubuntu 8.04.
4. I need some sort of insight on a good hosting panel (control panel).
5. I want to mount a WordPress server... yes, Apache, MySQL and PHP. LAMP.
6. Why would I need to host a DNS server and share it with one of the Netfirms DNS servers? What good does that?

The end product would be a server with a user-friendly control panel and
knowledge on how to use DNS server functions (if necessary, and BIND) and
Apache, no unnecessary software installed, my website (www.xpresalo.com)
registered under it, with the domain pointing to it, as well as email
accounts, FTP, SSH is easy to use (i select OpenSSH during install of Ubuntu
and use Putty for access), and the other bells and whistles listed in the
tutorials, finally with my WordPress blog under it.

If I'm asking for too much, let me know.

Regards,
Sebastien