Yes you can create an applet in NetBeans.
Help, Help Contents, Search, and then type in 'applet', one of the very first help topics explains exactly how to do it (Creating an Applet). In order to use the gui builder, again go to Help, Help Contents, Search, and type in 'gui builder'. The third or fourth topic down will send you to another link called 'Working With the GUI Builder, and 'Designing
Java GUI with GUI Builder'. Those are about as step by step as one can get.
Usually when things are not working like one expects, there are error messages thrown, or something happens that can be described. "I can not get it right" could mean that the GUI is not displaying at all, the buttons are not lining up, nothing happens when the buttons are clicked, there are no labels on the buttons, the background color is wrong, etc. We have no idea what you are seeing.
do I have to have all those other files that are created too
What files would those be?