Its important to keep regular backups of your data, particularly files that are you'd really be upset if you lost (finances, baby pictures, etc). I recently found a free program called Cobian Backup that is designed for making basic file copy or zip archive backups of your files - it won't burn them to CD or DVD but its a good start. Its a little fiddly to get working correctly mainly because there are a large variety of options, but once you do you'll have pretty reliable backups as needed.

There are a whole bunch of different programs out there for burning CDs and DVDs, my favorite over the years has been Nero Burning ROM. There's a new version (v7.0) available nd I've been trying it out for a few days, and I must admit that it is simply awesome! A common complaint of older versions was that it was difficult to use, well this version has had a whole bunch of little tweaks here and there that really improve this - little things like giving you an option of making a second copy when you burn a disc really add to the usability.