Because I wanted the option of having an About page (called Why Workchat, in this case) and because the feature is in beta, it sounded like a bad idea.

What I wanted seemed simple. The site would be primarily a forum, with an additional page about what I'm trying to create by making this site. 

I would like it to generate professional-looking, but (importantly) working forms to register members and let them recover or reset their passwords. 

And, as a designer, I would like to have some control over the look of the site. Not a lot. But I don't want it to feel generic.

That's basically it.

So you know, I have used Wordpress for years as a blogger, and have assembled a couple of simple sites myself. As a designer and creative director, I have developers who I hire to work on more complicated sites (where I need custom themes and so on).

This is what it feels like. Any help is enormously appreciated. Thank you!!

Do not give up, not that hard what you try to do, just put things in order. And do not install any other plugins for now.

Also are you using the option to turn Wordpress to wpForo? Is that what you want to do?

Also turn your site to https

@anonymous20 Yes, I'm sure that's true. And what I WILL do is hire a knowledgeable developer to sort this out. If this has nothing to do with wpForo, fine. But if you do have any understanding of what MIGHT be causing these issues, where to look, etc. it would be most helpful. If they are not caused by wpForo (which is the only plugin now running) I just don't know where else to investigate. 

Thanks.

To be honest i tried to follow your issues and possibly help but as @robert posted i was also confused.

Your problems are not complicated and you do not need a developer by any means. You just have to learn a bit how Wordpress works, themes, plugins etc.

Of cource if you can't, find someone to help you out.

This is the nicely formatted confirmation email I was receiving when BuddyPress and Contact Form 7 were both active. I don't know which of the two plugins generated this. I assume BuddyPress. I would love to generate professionally formatted emails like this but I would much prefer if THIS REGISTRATION SYSTEM JUST WORKED.

Ok, wpForo doesn't actually send any emails out (smtp). Just queues them to Wordpress. Also wpForo doesn't handle logins/registrations/lost password functions. Wordpress core does all that.

Keep that in mind.

This illegible mess is what showed up when I registered the new user Lizzybeth. I copied the URL from this and pasted it into a browser to be able to set a password. When I tried logging in using that password, I could not log in. Thinking I may have mistyped it when I registered, I tried to re-set it. That's when I discovered the re-set problem above,.

What email client is that?

AGH! NO!! It's still broken. I wish I could post mulitiple screenshots it it appears each post can only have one attachment. So I will do them sequentially. This first one shows the plugin states during my last test. ALL are deactivated except wpForo.

A lot of plugins after installed gives you those "suggestions" for other plugins to be installed. Use DISMISS and forget about it.

A good practice is NOT to install plugins that you do not need or plugins that you have no idea what they do.

I have deactivated BuddyPress. Here's a screenshot of what is installed. "Hello Dolly" came with my WP installation but it's not activated.

Hello Dolly comes with Wordpress, it is nothing, deactivate it and delete it.

Thanks.