Does Dreamhost offer the Fantastico control-panel-installation interface? It might help you a lot for installing things like forums, especially if you don't know much about PHP.
I use VizaWeb for my hosting services (excellent value) and I've installed all kinds of PHP stuff on my website (
http://www.kevlam.net) using almost no PHP coding of my own doing (and that includes following the installation instructions of prepackaged PHP tools).
Fantastico is a web-based interface where you point and click and tell it which script you wish to install (your host company pre-installs a selection) and after choosing a few options, you click "Go" and the next thing you know you have a working forum or blogging site or gallery. It's very handy. If your host provides it, use it. If they don't, maybe you can ask for it
That said, you sound like you know what you're doing in terms of HTML, so you're on your way. If you want to learn more about PHP I recommend the book I bought, "Programming PHP", by Lerdorf and Tatroe, published by O'Reilly books (generally, anything by O'Reilly books is excellent).
Good luck. I knew nothing about PHP when I started a year or two ago, and while I'm still no expert by any means, I'm finding lots and lots of cool stuff to do with it.