@richard Gore - Hi Richard

All beginnings are hard and we actually have a three part series on comments for WordPress on our blog

http://managewp.com/wordpress-blog-comments
http://managewp.com/wordpress-comments-plugins
http://managewp.com/right-comments-system-maximize-blog-engagement

ManageWP also features a Clean all spam comments feature, which will with a click of a button remove all spam comments on all your sites.