The easiest way to start a blog is to use WordPress. It's extremely userfriendly and it's also easy to maintain.
You can get a free blog from
http://wordpress.com
if you wish to install a blog on your OWN domain, then read this tutorial:
http://startbloggingonline.com
As an alternative, you could use tumblr as well, but it's bit too limited (in my opinion).
About followers? Share your blog to your friends, co-workers and so on.. If you produces interesting/good quality you will start receiving visitors and followers.
It takes some time, but it's worth it. Eventually you can even make money out of it.
Hope that helps,
Cheers!