To make a column the normal way is to use this HTML:
<div class="column">the content</div>
Then CSS something like this:
.column { width: 500px; float: left; margin: 10px; }
Hope that helps! By the way you could also try installing the Firefox addon, Firebug. Then you can right click a page, click "Inspect element" and it will show you the HTML and CSS. Google Chrome has this too.