Creating pages that link to Homepage menu items?

I'm completely new to creating a web site, but I'm not tech-phobic. I started out on Word Press today, spent hours trying to figure it out, finally gave up, and was told by someone on Reddit that SS is easier. SS is easier, but I'm still confused. For some reason,  I'm not understanding the underlying logic of the web pages that are supposed to be linked to my home page.

My goal:  to create a nice looking, fairly basic web site to house two different career portfolios to showcase my work.  I want my home page to have just a four menu items: Home, the title for each of my two portfolios, and Contact Info.  When someone clicks on one of the menu items from my home page, I don't understand where they go. After watching some of the tutorials, I get that I need to create a Page for each menu item (right?) , & I even recognize that somehow I can choose "portfolio" as a type of page. But how does the site know to link it to that specific menu item from my home page?  I don't see anything linking one to the other.

And when I choose a "portfolio" Page, I'm confused about how to post my writing. My goal is for someone using my page to navigate to that portfolio page, where they will see titles of each piece of writing; they can then click on whichever title they want to read the article they choose. But for some reason, I can't seem to do that. It's as if my only choice is to make the entire piece visible on the page, somewhat like a blog post (although even with a blog post, the entire article isn't usually visible unless the user clicks on a "continue reading" button or something like that).

In short, I feel like I'm missing some underlying logic of web site creation that everybody but me gets.  Can someone please help me understand:

 - How do menu items from the home page know where to go when someone clicks on them (how do I link them to the pages that I want users to see)?

- How do I create a writing portfolio that just shows the title of each of my articles (or even just a bit of the piece) and requires users to click on the title to continue reading?

Thanks

Let me see if I can answer your questions without getting to technical. Basically a Menu (navigation item) knows how to get to the correct page due to a built in link being created the moment you create a page in the linked section of your site. Your site uses the navigation title of the page to get to it, and you can change that title on the fly and it will still go to the page. Now that covers main pages that are in the linked section of your site. Folders and sub menus work a bit different. You have to add the page url address when you create a folder with multiple links in it. This is done by selecting the page or adding the page url on your site or off site when you create a link in a folder, same with a button or text link. . If you create a page in the unlinked section of your site, it does not appear on the Nav bar and the only way to get to that page is if you use the Page Slug/url for that page either by typing it in the address bar yourself or put the page url on a button or as a link somewhere. 

Now if you are usinga  SS 7.0 landing page as your home page then you have to add those links yourself same as using any other button or link. I suspect you are using 7.1 which does not use landing pages. 

Let me ask you this. What is your primary purpose for you site? Do you want ot write stories or articles? Do yo plan on posting images? I ask because if you want to write a blog page is the way to go, if you plan on posting images than a portfolio page what is called an idex page with Squarespace 7.0 is also good to use. Portfolio pages have sub pages and if you want to go directly to a sub page that requires an anchor link on the nav bar. I suggest you stick to basic pages to start with. 

Blog pages can be enhanced by using what is called a summary block. A summary block pulls content from your blog page and posts items on the page, a bit of text and an image when clicked on goes to the full post. As a writer and photographer, I use both index pages and blog summary blocks. I also have folders with links and I use many buttons on my site which you can take a look at here: my random views and I have a landing page as my home page, but my "main page" has the nav bar on it. Play around with my  7.0 site which is built on the Avenue timplate. if you have any questions about it or any other templates just let me know. I will be glad to answer them. 

Derrick.