recovering a blog attached to a website

I had a website that I took down in 2016 because it was in flash. However, there was a link that took one to my blog, which was installed as part of the website.

It took me a while, until now actually, to get situated and launch a new website, now I am trying to find my blog and it doesn’t show up under my email address.

When I tried to sign in on this forum, I discovered I had to register because this is different from wordpress[dot]com – and that wordpress[dot]org would have been what I installed on my website – is that correct?

I never saved or downloaded that blog because I thought it would always be around since no one can edit a wordpress blog but the user.

*this did not say “wordpress” on it – because it was attached to my website. so yes, I installed it that way. does that make sense?

**what I did already – I tried to start a new blog and used the name of this one I want to recover – that name refused to be allowed, but despite having 3 other blogs attached to my email address – that one isn’t.

I am very confused about the differences between wordpress [dot ] com and [dot] org; and really appreciate anyone helping – thanks!!