I'm trying to setup some forum software on my host, and I can't for the life of me figure out how to get it going.

the URL is http://kawf.ridethevibe.net

The only thing that I was having trouble with, was that I was supposed to change some stuff in the apache config file, i was supposed to setup a virtual host with a particular document root within the "software" tree and establish some url rewrites. Now, I don't have access to my apache config file, so I established a subdomain with the appropriate document root, and made a .htaccess file in that folder:

Code:
Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteEngine On

RewriteRule ^(pics/.*|css/.*|robots.txt|favicon.ico|apple-touch-icon.png)$ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(account|admin|tips)/.*$ /$1.php [L]
RewriteRule ^(\.*)$ /forums.php [L]
RewriteRule /\.* /forums.php [L]


php_flag magic_quotes_gpc Off

AddDefaultCharset ISO-8859-1

#password-protect multiple files
AuthName "Restricted Area" 
AuthType Basic 
AuthUserFile /home/ridethev/.htpasswd 
AuthGroupFile /dev/null 
<Files setup.inc>
require valid-user
</Files>
<Files config.inc>
require valid-user
</Files>
Now all of my rewrites appear to be functioning properly, but I can't for the life of me get anything to actually work right. I'm supposed to hit create.phtml (which isn't actually located within the root directory, it's a script embeded in a php file elsewhere) but it doesn't work.

What supposed to happen is if I go to /create.phtml or /forumname/post name, it'll redirect to the forums.php file which calls upon a file in a separate directory named main.php, and then locates the script within that main.php file.

at least, that's my understanding of it. now it dosn't work, at all, as you can see I just get a 404 error saying that the script forums.php does not exist, which it does. and if I change the coding in forums.php, or in the main.php to say a redirect to google, it will forward me to google. so what gives? I'm guessing my rewrites are at fault, but i dont know where to go from here.

an example of this kind of forum in use can be found at http://forums.quattroworld.com

and before i forget, this is an example of the changes i should have made to the apache config:

Code:
<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName kawf.org

# ----- start cut here for plesk vhost.conf ----- #
DocumentRoot /usr/local/kawf/config

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
    RewriteEngine On

    RewriteRule ^/(pics/.*|css/.*|robots.txt|favicon.ico|apple-touch-icon.png)$ /$1 [L]
    RewriteRule ^/(account|admin|tips)/.*$	/$1.php [L]
    RewriteRule /.*				/forums.php [L]
</IfModule>

<IfModule mod_php5.c>
    php_flag magic_quotes_gpc Off
</IfModule>

# Template engine has problems with UTF8. Force single byte charset
AddDefaultCharset ISO-8859-1
# ----- end cut here for plesk vhost.conf ----- #

</VirtualHost>
any help is appreciated!