Re: Successful install, but where is the administration area?
Please post a screenshot of your admin screen after you log in and click Admin. There are normally more options than what you’re describing. I think they are “Users”, “Manage” and “Design” on the left, then a couple more on the right (settings and plugins.)
For how to place a link to the forum in your WordPress site, that’s highly dependent on your theme. But a basic html link will normally work, depending on where you’re putting it.
<a href="http://www.example.com/forums/">Forums</a>
If you’re putting it near wp_list_pages, in an unordered list, then it needs to be wrapped in li tags.
<li><a href="http://www.example.com/forums/">Forums</a></li>