Re:
The secure pages are only active when needed for things like Customer Account information and order reports as well as the checkout ...

Actually they do not show up for Customer Account information when I click login: the page where I can create a new account or log into and existing acct comes over as HTTP:// not HTTPS:// and after I enter the email and the password the welcome part is still unsecure HTTP://.

Even when I login to HTTPs://mysite.com/admin it changes to HTTP:// at the username password page.