HTML Export, CSS Styling

["David A. Gershman" <gershman@dagertech.net>]

I've been reading all evening about HTML exporting, style sheets, etc. 
Maybe I've been inundated with information, but I haven't been able to
determine an answer to my question: can text in the middle of a
paragraph by styled?  For example:

* Heading 1
   This is the paragraph body that will allow *bold*
   or /italic/ or even _underline_, but what if I want
   only THIS word to have styling?  Such as making it
   red to indicate importance?


I'm working on lecture notes and I was planning on a <span></span> tag
so I can set the color and, ultimately, a 'title' attribute for a
definition when hovered.  However, I'm only finding the "#+HTML" feature
within org which seems to need to be on a line of its own.  Howver, the
export would convert:

  This is the paragraph body that will allow *bold*
   or /italic/ or even _underline_, but what if I want
   only
    #+HTML: <span.....>THIS</span>
   word to have...

to 3 different paragraphs:

   This is the paragraph body that will allow *bold*
   or /italic/ or even _underline_, but what if I want
   only
   THIS
   word to have...

Am I missing something or is "in-line styling" just not a feature within
Org (yet?)?

Thanks!

--David