I build with the help of Netscape 7.02  Composer- visually for placement so I see what's what-
and also for the html source editor. I like using it to correct typos.
I use Notepad from time to time too; and regularly just edit the code directly from the site.

Sometimes I look into W3C Validation.
I didn't really get into CSS much beyond the basics.
While it may not be necessary to call up the same span tag when it's been named already,
some non-IE browsers don't see that.
CSS does help to skim down the page sizes a lot, though; particularly the Souplets.

A bit of frames do help. The Guestbook is most easily placed as it is with a frame; and
iframes help in the Souplets and Imvs.

Gallery slideshows do use Javascript; slightly modified to call up the 3-seconds instead of the original's 15 seconds..
The displayed size also is as is and not a shrunken version as in the original.
I added instructions as well ^^;

Around the site, some basic php is used to call up bits of regular coding; again helping
to reduce page size and providing little templates I can edit instead of having to change so many pages.