Again please pardon my ignorance however I am very new to this. Is there any way to add content (i.e posts pages) and configure a self hosted wordpress blog, and not make it visible to the public yet? The reason for this is I am doing this as a side project as I go to school and play sports, so I don't have an abundance of time right now to start one. I would however like to be able to chip away at it little by little but not have it visible to the public until it's official launch date.
Download and install xampp or codex, you can develop and test on your PC without being "live" on the web.
You can use password protected plugin to hide your site from public.But the best method to work is localhost as malky66 said.