Adding a visible counter...but a question I haven't seen posted about it!

Hi, I'm using a FastCounter that I've had on my website for years. But it's taking a long time to load these days, it seems, so I'd like to use the visible Zencart counter and place it in the footer, under the banner.

However, since I have about 540,000 hits to my site, I'd like to set the counter to the correct number when I switch over. Can I do this and what would the code be for it? And which files do I need to put it for the footer?

Also, I don't want it only to show unique visitors, I want it to advance anytime anyone clicks on a page in the site. It can say: "You are visitor number XXXXX" but I'd prefer NOT to say "...since 1/1/05" or whatever.

Thanks.

My site: https://www.maceddy.com

OK, I carefully read all the threads re: hit counters and then looked in my admin and found it actually showed about 200,000 more hits than the FastCounter one I already have....and want to get rid of.

So, following directions, I edited the following file: /includes/templates/YOURTEMPLATE/common/tpl_footer.php

and near the bottom I edited it like this:

But it doesn't show up in my footer.

Is this correct and am I saving it into the correct file?

All my other default things that actually show up in my common footer are in this file:
public_html/includes/languages/YOURTEMPLATE/english.php

My Zencart version is: 1.2.6 and website: https://www.maceddy.com.

At this point I don't want to re-set the counter, or change the date, or anything except be able to see the counter in the footer.

Thanks! Sharon