Dashboard Tour

Once you've logged into the administration section of WordPress you should see a control panel that looks pretty much like the following:

The left panel lists the major areas you can manager as an administrator: Posts, Media, Links, Pages and Comments (which are all types of content) and Appearance, Plugins, Users, Tools and Settings (which are all something other than content). If you click on any of the items in this list the list will expand to show tasks within that item.

The middle section of the page has a box labeled Right Now. This gives a quick overview of the status of your site including the version of WordPress you are using.

The QuickPress on the right lets you write a quick post and publish it without going to the main edit window.