[Samba] help with basics

[David McBride]

I am new to linux and Samba.  I have a box with Slackware 8.0 (no xwindows)
and Samba (that came on the CD) installed.  I am useing the
/etc/samba/smb.config-sample remaned to smb.conf file for my configuration
file for Samba to learn on.  I have read many how-to's and article on the
net to the point that I am only getting more frustrated and confussed.  I
would like to start out with a few basic questions that I just dont seem to
fully understand from what I have read.  I am useing a Win2K box to test
Samba with.  I can browse through network neighborhood to the "slacknet"
workgroup, but get the errors for account autorization errors or access
denied.  I can even do find computer and see the system netbios name of the
slackware box, but still no access.
1. how does the line "guest account = pcguest" affect things if left
commented out or uncommented.
2. can someone tell me what option for the line "security = " I need to use
if I want Samba to ask for a user name and password when I try to access it
from my win2k box.  I have created a local user with "adduser" and added it
to the samba user list with "smbpasswd", but it never asks for login info
when I try to connect to samba.  the user account I created was 'guest01".
3. I have a section that reads
[public]
  path=/usr/somewhere/else/public
  public=yes
  only guest=yes
  writable=yes
  printable=no
Is this good enough or does anything need to be changed?

Thanks so much for your patience with a newbie,
David