These should automatically show up in the Add-ins tab. To make it really look nice, tho, you're going to have to learn how to manipulate the ribbon. I recommend "RibbonX Customizing the Office 2007 Ribbon" by Martin, Puls, Hennig

The book Bob mentions is an excellent resource. You can usually find a used copy online for under $15. While you wait for it to arrive you might try:

http://gregmaxey.mvps.org/Customize_Ribbon.htm

You can use the quick access bar for this functionality. It will put the commands right at the top next to the Office pearl button.

To do it, right click a command you want and choose the "Add to Quick Access Toolbar" option:

Were your "lots of useful little tools" just built-in Word commands or were they macros that you wrote yourself?

Edit: You could use VSTO to create a custom task pane. There might be a bit of a learning curve if you've only worked with VBA and are moving to .NET development, but it would be worth your time to learn the new tools if you're doing any Office customization work.

Here are a couple articles to get you started:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa338197.aspx

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb772082.aspx

You can pretty easily convert the toolbars that are all lumped in the add-ins tab of the ribbon to their own tab using the Custom UI software. It's not very hard to use.

http://openxmldeveloper.org/articles/customuieditor.aspx

To get a floating toolbar, you'll have to create a modeless Userform. Also not very hard to do.