Hi

Running WAMP on XP Pro

Carolight was good enough to recommend WAMP. I have created a zencart database but I still cannot get the installation to connect to the created database.

Obviously I am looking to install locally so that I can get to grips with making some of the more advanced templates. I know that I am missing a basic step because I have installed zencart successfully a couple of times on web hosting servers.

Do I have to put the database in a particular place on the hdd? I feel such a dunce and I'm wasting precious time!

Also, I am looking to edit the css in a GUI editor (I know that I cannot name it!) and the PHP/XHTML in Notepad++ (hope that its ok to name this) so that I can see the changes dynamically. Is there a one stop shop for the literature required to build the kind of templates that I see on the professional sites. All that I can do at the minute is save the XHTML code generated by the ZenCart PHP script on my hosting servers and load the CSS into my editor. This is great for changing background colours, fonts, buttons etc. but I want to be able to alter the size of the divs that create the structure of the zencart pages.
I can handcode XTML Strict and CSS (but the GUI editor is a great help) so I just need some literature to follow step by step.
PHP is very new to me so I do not understand all of the syntax yet, but I understand enought to know what XHTML is generated by blocks of code so I do not think that this is beyond me.
I did nearly lose the plot and go with another e-commerce solution but something is telling me to hang in with ZenCart. I have been battling with the page layouts for about a year now and I'm starting to feel about as intelligent as a mule!

Please help me someone, I'm going mad. I was made redundant 8 months ago so I need to increase the number of services that I can provide to maintain an income as a freelance web designer. ZenCart rules but I am having a major mental block!

I know that I am asking a lot, but a step in the right direction will save my sanity and my mortgage.