Originally Posted by BigFurry

First you should decide if you want to create a paid site or free site. Generally it's not good to mix the two.

If you want both, create two separate sites and cross link them. But it's really hard to make one site successful, two at the same time is near impossible.
So you really should decide if you want a free site or paysite first, and focus only on that.

Paid sites:
For paysites, the cheapest option to test if your idea is working is starting on a platform that handles it all for you. Centroprofits.com or OnlyFans.com come to mind.
If you want a paysite that you run on your own, go with the ElevatedX as the core. But that will be more expensive and you will spend a lot of your time on other stuff than creating your content and marketing. I don't think that's a good idea for you at the moment. The first thing should be to know if there's a demand for the content you produce.

Design:
If you can invest more money for a unique design (free or paid), have your site designed by an experienced team such as https://www.zuzanadesigns.com/