Firstly, if IRC is new to you then read section 1.2.
Startup XChat and select "Server List" in the "X-Chat" menu. This will display a list of default IRC servers. If you have your own IRC server you like then hit "New Server" and enter it's details at the bottom.
Now fill in your personal details at the top.
I will assume you are using a local server (not in the default list) of 127.0.0.1 and my nick of Nebulae. If you ever do use my nick I will NOT be happy, so choose one of your own or open /usr/dict/words and choose one from there.
Press connect and (hopefully) you will connect. The opening text will scroll down the main text-box with the MOTD (Message Of The Day). Once that has stopped click on the input box and type:
/join #dgg5ds
Make 'dgg5ds' anything you like. You should see a line saying <your nick> (<your address>) has joined #channel and your nick should show up in the user-list with a green dot by it showing that you are chanop (since you just created the channel). Since you just created the channel you'll also see a line saying you have given yourself chanop status.
If you type normal text (without a leading /) then you will see it come up in the channel with your nick before it. If anyone else was in the channel they would also see that.
Click in the text box in the tool-bar, type My Topic and hit enter. The topic of the channel is now My Topic, you will see a line telling you so. If you play about with the letter buttons on the tool-bar you can change the channel modes (more on this later).
If you hit too much too quickly you will see XChat "slow down", this is because if you flood (send too much data too quickly) the server will drop the connection so XChat limits the amount of data it will send, this can make it seem slow, but it will always catch up in the end.
Now if you type /msg <your nick> Hello and hit enter in the input box (at the bottom) you send a private message to yourself, saying Hello. You wouldn't normally do this, if you have such bad hand-eye co-ordination that you need to type something and read it, you need to see a doctor, this is just for testing. A new window will be created under the current one, and its leaf will appear in the tool-bar, with the text in red to show that it has changed.
If you click on the new leaf the window will come to the top and you'll see the message Hello from yourself. When you type into the input box in this window the text will goto the object in the window, in this case yourself, in the last case the channel #dgg5ds. If you type anything you will see it echoed back at you. Since you aren't all that interested in messaging yourself (I hope) click the X button on the tool-bar (top - left) and the window will disappear, showing the first window.
Now if you select your nick in the user-list and hit the button marked Whois at the bottom of the user-list your whois information will be shown in the text box. This information comes from the server and can be read by anyone on IRC.
The whois information can also be accessed as a command. In the input box type /whois <your nick> and hit enter. Note the leading / showing it is a command, without this the text would be sent to the channel. The buttons map onto these commands, click the Settings menu and select User-list buttons. A dialog will appear showing each button and the command it runs when pressed, you can add your own. Note that %s in the command is replaced by the nick of the selected entry in the user-list.
Now if you right clic