Now that wordpress is version 2.7.1 many old themes have not been updated or do not seem to be fully widget optimised; which is a shame.
However I am very inexperienced in these matters and doubtless will resolve the problem as days go by.
Here is a theme I really, really like from plaintxt.org
which Scott wants to pass on to anyone who wants to run with it.
I hope someone does soon.
And as this has just started I’d like to enthuse mightily about this plugin which is a drop down menu for the admin page making it sooooooo much nicer