fresh install 14.04

[arelem3]

A friend is using a Dell1520 laptop, the hard drive has 2 partitions. 
Windows xp  and a blank partition that was intended for Ubuntu when 
originally purchased from Dell, years ago.

The owner wants now to move from xp to Linux but for comfort zone 
feelings I'd rather not remove windows for the time being.

My questions are, if I install 14.04 on the second partition will it 
overwrite the MBR and lose windows access or will it simply create the 
grub boot menu with the choices of xp and Ubuntu? I would prefer the latter

Will some of the files in My Documents and other personal folders on xp 
be accessible to Ubuntu?

Thanks in advance
Roger