Many people want a domain name but don't necessarily want or need to host the domain name. Rather, they develop a site on say GeoCities and then purchase a domain name and have it point to their GeoCities or other site. This is call Domain Name Forwarding.

This is how it works:

1. Go to a site that has domain name registration and free forwarding, e.g. www.1planhost.com, www.1and1.com.
2. You sign up for a domain name, e.g. joeblowshomepage.com.
3. Request that your domain name "points" to some URL, any page on the web, e.g. http://www.geocities.com/joeblowshomepage.
4. Pay the fee, from $5-$9/year.

Once the registration goes through and your domain name becomes active (about 5-7 business days) whenever anyone goes to www.jobblowshomepage.com they will be automatically re-directed (forwarded) to the site, http://www.geocities.com/joeblowshomepage.

HOWEVER, when the visitor gets to your site they will see http://www.geocities.com/joeblowshomepage in their browser's location bar, not www.jobblowshomepage.com.

At some later time you could purchase hosting and then, at the registrant's site, access your domain name manager and change the DNS names to those of your new host, i.e. cancel the forwarding and use DNS names instead.