On Tuesday, 8 October 2019 10:03:33 UTC+1, Mike Halmarack wrote:
Basically, I'm wondering whether I should go for an off the peg
Wordpress template or attempt the simplest, go it alone tutorial I can
find?

The free hosted Wordpress at wordpress.com is so limited it's hardly worth bothering with (their ads, no custom themes, no plugins, no Google Analytics, etc). You'd be better using Google Sites IMHO.

If you want powerful Wordpress you need to pay wordpress.com (quite a lot of) money for a 'business', or use a Wordpress installation on your own server (self hosting), which unless you have your own physical server usually means paying someone for a virtual server - and most of those can automatically set up a standard Wordpress hosted site with a couple of clicks from a package manager.

Basic HTML is okay for static sites but once you want to add in responsiveness to smartphones and tablet browsers, commenting and social media plugins etc I'd be looking at some form of Content Management System, of which Wordpress may be most suitable.

If it's good enough for the White House, Cap Gemini and Network Rail ...

There are scripts to import a free wordpress.com site into a self-hosted wordpress.org site if you want to start simple/free.

Owain