I keep coming across jQuery and now want to learn what all the fuss is about 

Most of my dev time has been spent in the Sencha suite of products, and I wondered how one would go about designing and coding a complex nested layout using jQuery. I think I am right in saying there are no jQuery provided UI design tools, but there are some out there which claim to be compatible?

I'm so used to using ExtJS config driven components, it just seems a bit alien to me going back but I am keen to find out more and get something barebones up and running, e.g. left side panel, top banner, main content area, embedded Google Maps display, etc..

Thanks!