[mcantelon]

Maybe start with microframeworks. Something like Flask (Python), Express (Node.js), or Sinatra (Ruby). Once you get a bit comfortable in them start using template engines to separate your logic from your presentation. Then look at adding libraries to support different storage engines, etc.

Using microframeworks, you will basically have to implement a lot of things from scratch, but you'll end up recognizing the patterns of common web application development. Knowing these patterns will make it easier to learn monolithic web frameworks like Django. It'll also motivate you: at some point having to reinvent every wheel gets old.

Try a lot of things and make lots of mistakes. At some point it'll all just make sense.