It actually is. The original standard published by the IEEE 802.11 group was 802.11, often referred to as 802.11 prime.

To put it simply, it was little more than a proof of concept. The only wireless cards that I know were made at that time, were very expensive and only purchased in very limited amounts by large corporations. Quickly afterwards it was replaced by 802.11a and 802.11b. the big difference between the two, was that b used 2.4ghz and could achieve 11mbps, while a used 5Ghz, and could achieve 54mbps.

Meanwhile prime was on 900mhz and if memory serves, never achieved more than a few Mbps.

802.11b was more popular because 2.4ghz was easier to make inexpensively at the time, and so 802.11g also used 2.4ghz, but was able to increase bandwidth by using OFDM. But now I’m off topic, I just find wireless history very interesting.

The point is 802.11 (prime) was a valid wireless standard.