How interesting to see this thread. I missed it all the previous times it came around. I didn't know we had an HTML editor. Oh, actually, I've just looked and - at the moment - we don't have one. But I saw a whole set of articles on the site on HTML basics and I'll certainly be reading those.
But in answer to the question, I'm not an absolute beginner, and I comfortably use what I usually need in preparing articles for BellaOnline. Some things I have to look up. And having done it, still don't understand how to apply it.