What must be kept?

I would love for someone to post a skeleton of what is needed and tell me where I can place content etc… I have several shell templates, I would like to fill with the blog. I just have no idea where to begin.

I notice that some files are not needed in the templating process, can someone tell me what files are used for the template itself and which are not. this is for version 1.5 THANKS so much.

I have looked at the

http://wordpress.org/docs/template/

documents, but im not sure how to use these in a template. Also the footer, header, and other files are seperate. What part controls the look of the layout. What parts can I just leave alone?