Hi Med,
I suggest that you hack JSP/Servlet/JavaBeans first if you're new into J2EE and not dive head-on with EJB. The experience will come very handy later on with EJB. And then use an MVC framework at first opportunity.
Struts will be more like it.
Here's an excellent Struts article on developing a message/bulletin board, courtesy of InformIT.com:
Using the Struts Framework to Develop a Message Board--Part I: Introduction By Maneesh Sahu
It's a seven-part series so brace yourself
Also, it's dated so just make the necessary adjustments; the main ideas are what's important.
Hope that helps. GL!
Ex Animo Java!
-- Val
[ August 06, 2002: Message edited by: Val Pecaoco ]