Replacing a hard drive

[kiwisteve]

Hi,
The family PC's hard drive died and I bought a replacement. I connected it up (power and data) and popped a W95 OS CD in the draw and started it up.
I assumed (as with an Apple Mac) that the PC would boot up using the CD and then I would load the OS onto the HD and then rebot and install application software. Apparenly not.
The PC was bought in 2000 and did not come with any software on CD - it was all on the HD when bought it from the shop. All I have is a W95 system disk that I picked up at the market and an MSWord disk.
No amount of trying to start up with the old HD and a 'boot up' floppy came anywhere near fixing it. I just got HD ERROR messages on a DOS screen.
I use Apple Macs for everything I do, but the rest of the family use the PC so I am out of my depth. I have the confidence and the ability - I just don't know the procedure...
Any help would be great.
Cheers