Dreamweaver is a nice piece of software yes, but i suggest you search some tutorials in HTML. Learn the basics as it pays to actually know whats happening behind what you see and edit in dreamweaver. :)
I have used vbulletin extensively...although its a paid script. but in my own opinion, its probably the best one out there in terms of stability, support, and features. but costs a bit much hehe. If you have the money for it, go buy it and try.
yeap i thinka cleaner background would make the site better...try to make the images' opacity lesser and see if its better. cos imo, its distracting. otherwise, the design is great already.