If anyone needs additional assistance, I'm available to help. I've been an IRC user for >4 years, and can help you with some shortcuts that autojoin you to your desired channels, as well as hook you up to the proper server automatically upon launching the program. Also, mIRC is good, and Trillian is an excellent alternative that allows you to chat through Yahoo!Messenger, MSN, AIM, ICQ as well.
E-mail me direct or in the mailing list if you need help.
Brian
Team A.I.
I haven't lost my mind. It's backed up on disk somewhere.