General Support: Customising my index page, how?!

I was wondering if anyone could help me out with this, i want to make my default plogger page a bit different. Instead of just having the categories and albums listed on the default page ie index.php, i want a layout with some details at the top, a little bit of text etc and then below are the thumbs for the albums.

I reallly dont have any need for the categories, but i guess i can lose them by linking to the category instead of index and then removing the category link at the top.

Anyone suggest a bit of help for me to do this, its aching my brain trying!

Thanks to anyone who can point me in the right direction!