cPanel License - Small time accounts?

You can also pay for a cPanel license on a monthly basis from a distributor:

cPanel Partners - cPanel Inc.

However, if you are not familiar with hosting or do not have a very good basic understanding of the Linux operating system, you are really better off, as Infopro mentioned, with a VPS package from a hosting provider, rather than trying to set up a server yourself and buying a cPanel license. VPS packages are available at very affordable prices, and the hosting provider can help you with configuring the operating system and other tasks that you may not be familiar with and which are beyond our (cPanel, Inc.) scope of support.

If you only need to host one site, or even just a few sites, you might want to consider just a hosting package from a host that uses cPanel. We have a list of partners who provide hosting here:

cPanel Partner Search - cPanel Inc.

If your knowledge and understanding of Linux is limited, and you just need to host a site or two, a hosting package makes more sense than the complexity of running your own server. It really is a big step to go from running a single site, to administrating a server that hosts many sites, and it requires a good fundamental understanding of the operating system and of how the Internet works in general.