As someone who's never worked in the Microsoft development world, is a "Dev Center" account what one needs to publish apps to the MS Store, or is this something

As someone who's never worked in the Microsoft development world, is a "Dev Center" account what one needs to publish apps to the MS Store, or is this something else? I have an interest in playing around with WinPho/Metro apps, and if dropping $8 now means I can push anything I create to the store, then this is pretty appealing.