bilingual site

I am creating a small site that needs to be in French and English. I have already done the translation, so don’t need a translation plugin. I want the French/English choice to be at the top of the page. My questions are:

1. What’s the best way to do this? I’ve looked at WPML, but is there another (free) option? I’m a beginner, so need something easy!

2. I briefly experimented with qTranslate X and the French/English widget kept going to the bottom of the homepage, not the top. How do you get the language choice to be at the top of the page when using these plugins?

3. Once the widget is installed, I have the 2-language choice. But how do I create and link the site in the second language? I don’t understand how this works.

Thanks!