Gamertag Dillemma

Okay, so I've never used Xbox Live on my Xbox 360 before. I have an offline gamertag with over 10,000 gamerscore, and a lot of save files associated with it. The gamertag I've always wanted to have is 'Matthewest', so to make sure nobody else took the name before I got live, I made Matthewest on the xbox website. I then realised that I couldn't delete the said gamertag once I was ready to get live. I want to be able to have Matthewest as my gamertag whilst keeping all the gamerscore and achievements I collected offline. If it helps, my offline gamertag is still Matthewest. If anyone could help it'd be much appreciated :)

I've heard there's a one off gamertag change that's free, and then any more costs 800 ms points. Is that true?Matthewest

I've heard there's a one off gamertag change that's free, and then any more costs 800 ms points. Is that true?Matthewest

Ah ok. Is there some sort of way to get the Xbox.com gamertag deleted that I don't know of? Report it perhaps? I tried emailing microsoft but I received an email saying there wasn't a way to delete it. I think that if I rang them I'd get a different story.. you know what ms is like..