Heres the UK mother-site. The easiest way is to get the prototyping PCB with PIC attached and a socket for downloading progs etc (standard serial RS232). You just replace the resonator with a Crystal (avilable anywhere and cheap), instructions are in datasheets and the free software.
The Picaxe chips come with a basic interpreter built in (thats how they make money, charge a bit extra for the PICs, so the softwares free). Its all insanely well integrated and easy to program/use, but it is interpretted basic, which the purists will laugh at. I dont care, the PICs are sooo fast now, Ive used them in realtime industrial apps to great effect.
If you down load the sotware and poke around the manuals in the help drop down (easy and quick to peruse), youll quickly see how it works.
If you just want a clock, then an 8bit PIC/crystal with a one line pwm setup command is easy, but youll just need to make a serial lead (or buy one from them).
BTW, they have this silly cheap little PCB with an 8 bit PIC and dual output motor driver (and serial download socket !), that would be fine as a stepper controller. There are several one line commands designed just for stepper contol, have a look in the BASIC commands manual.