hello i tried many linux distros but the only one that recognized my home wireless network was mandriva and i was hoping to linux mint or pclinux,i get to the stage where it asks for ssid-mode-bssid-mac address-mtu and i am lost,i can see my i.p. address and i think the ssid is what i call my home network,but i am not sure about mac address and bssid?
i have posted on linux forums but what they tell me to do goes over my head as i am not as pc savvy as them.
any ideas please?
thank you.

First of all, your better off posting in the Linux Forums or Mandriva Forums. Have you tried Ubuntu? They have a great community with lots of how to's and help. You can try the GUI tools that come with your distro, but what tools you use depend on what desktop your running i.e. KDE, Gnome etc. You can try connecting from the command line using iwconfig see the link below

http://www.susegeek.com/wireless/iwconfig-...ility-in-linux/

thank you i will try to setup using command line