Como (I eat), Como (how)?

I'm a new student and have a question that may be pretty basic. In the sentence "No como carne.", como is the yo form of the verb comer (to eat) and the sentence means "I don't eat meat." And in the sentence "Como estas?" como means "how" and the sentence translates "how are you? " Two different words with the same spelling? Do you just know which one it is by the content?

Hola Nancy bienvenida al foro, Yes, you know by context. There are many words like that. Saber means to know, know how, but it also means taste. Fresa is a strawberry but it also a dentist's drill, muñeca can be the wrist or a doll. Just a few examples Saludos, Rich

Wow, speedy reply! Thanks for explaining. My question arose from reading about the importance of accent marks and how they distinguish different words. Not a steadfast rule or help I guess.

Rich is right, as always. You are going to run across a ton of words like that, spelled the same, pronounced the same, but with different meanings. Some will have accents, some won't, and some will be pronounced the same with or without the accent (like "se" and sé).