creating a constructed language - the very very basics

I'm coming up with a constructed language (aka conlang) for something Storm and I are working on.  The context is that we have a group of folks who are living in an environment a lot like the Pacific Northwest--temperate rainforest near a relatively cold ocean, cut off from the rest of the continent by a mountain range.  I don't need a lot out of this conlang--names and a few words for things, mostly.  I started out with one word that was from this language--vashal, which translates as "protector".  The reason we have that word is that about 20k years after this book is originally set, the word surfaces in our Egypt-equivalent as an antique religious term.

So.  Where do you start with something like this?

Well, I know a couple of things from the one word I have.  One is that the language contains the phonemes /v/, /sh/, /l/, and /ah/.  (I'm not going to be using IPA, since typing in IPA is really annoying.)  I know that /v/ can be used in the beginning of a word, /sh/ in the middle, and /l/ at the end.  I'll go ahead and add all four of those sounds to my phoneme list, separated out into consonants and vowels for my convenience.

At this point, I need to make some more decisions and some distinctions.  I want to keep the phoneme list pretty small, and I want the words in this language to look exotic but relatively pronounceable.  And, just as important, I want the language to be distinct from any of the other languages of this world.   Because I'm only creating words, I am not going to create any syntax rules right now.  (And orthography is going to closely follow pronunciation, because these folks don't do much writing as a general rule.)

So.  I need some distinct phonetic features.  I ponder, think about clicks, and decide that one of the features of this language is going to be that they make use of the breathy voice as a distinction with some of their consonants.  So, for instance, they have /j/ and /jh/, /l/ and /lh/, /p/ and /ph/.  This isn't a distinction we draw in English, but it's a feature of some other languages.

We've got /l/, easy enough to add /r/.  I'll add in a few alveolar consonants: /d/, /t/, /th/ (unvoiced).  I should probably add a glottal stop, but that way lies apostrophes and many fantasy cliches, so I don't.  

I muddle around a little bit and decide on vowels: /a/, /o/, /iu/, /i/, /e/, /au/, /ai/.  /iu/ is a dipthong; in practice /iu/ sounds like "woo" with only the faintest hint of a w at the beginning.  /ai/ is pronoiunced like the English word "I".  This is a super-limited list, and I'm going to consider it only partial for the moment.  I could easily double the list by adding breathy versions of the vowels, but English orthography doesn't really lend itself to that.  I currently have a schwa on my list, but I'm pondering removing it.

So, i have the following phonemes:

Consonants:
/jh/, /vh/, /v/, /k/, /kh/, /th/, /t/, /ph/, /h/, /sh/, /d/, /l/, /lh/, /ph/, /r/

Vowels:
/a/, /o/, /iu/, /i/, /e/, /au/, /ai/, /(schwa)/,

Lots of afficates and fricatives on that list.  Only two bilabials: /p/ and /ph/.  I ponder and decide that's probably fine--they may simply not make a distinction between most of the sounds you can make with both lips.  No nasals, and that's deliberate for worldbuilding-related reasons.

And then, I need some rules!  I make some words with the phoneme list, play around a bit, and come up with the following extremely barebones set of restrictions:

Vowels not allowed to begin words.
/th/, /sh/, /l/, /r/ never begin a word.
T is /t/ at the beginning of a word and /th/ in the middle/end.
/v/, /k/, /jh/, /vh/ never end words.
Vowels are always pronounced.
Only consonant allowed to be in the same syllable with another consonant is /l/.

This isn't much, but it's enough for me to go on for the moment, along with a sense of what's going to be at least somewhat comprehensible and distinct to an English-reading eye.  I come up with a list of words, such as:

Jhale
Hauthl
Hali
Jhired 
Jhide
Kalith
Vhori
Virthredi
Varikh
Tiukh
Jhair
Daulsh
Daikhath
Tavh
Vashal (of course)

I look the list over and decide that I like it.  Jhale will be the name of my protagonist.  Vhori are dragonish creatures.  A tavh is a singer/shaman/bard.  Daikhath are people--specifically, the name of this particular human-ish species for itself, and is related to the word tavh obliquely.  Most of the rest of the words will end up being names.

I'll come up with a longer list of words at some point, and as I go along I'll add in some more restrictions as well as some language features. (I'll need some honorifics, some words for various kinds of music, and I'll need to decide what sort of compounding scheme the language uses.)  And eventually, i'll know a lot more about the culture and will be able to add language features in to reflect what I learn.  

So there you have it--one method of coming up with a conlang when you only need a few words for untranslatable terms.