for a noob

I think he should learn text files, then databases.
I second that, although something as simple as a poll would be a good stepping stone to a DB from a flat file system ( for a learning project in the future ).

Both have there advantages working with flat files you tend to pick up a lot of pattern matching skills, and working with databases, well, you pick up SQL skills!

IMHO: for such a simple project as a poll it's more time efficient to write a script for a flat file than a DB!