I read through the entire create 2 columns sticky post, but it's over my nuB head... I also carefully looked through the WP plugin lists.... and searched this forum...(especially "magaine" style).... still don't get it...

What I'm trying to achieve functionally is something like one sees in these two websites, where each of the several areas is displaying title/excerpts either from specific categories in it's own blog, or feeds from other blogs. So simultaneously on one web page are areas highlighting content from a variety of sources. And they're not all on sidebars, but (in the first example) distributed all over the page...

For examples:
http://www.commondreams.org
http://blog.zinio.com/

Is it possible to do this with ATA settings and plugins/widgets, ie: without much code changing? Help appreciated - thanks!

The term "simply" is quite relative but what you want to accomplish could probably be achieved with sidebars and/or new widget areas. Sidebars would be the easiest. You can set sidebar widths, have up to 4 natively and put widgets that would show posts from other feeds and/or show posts from your blog.

Thanks, Larry, but what about the center column? Would it work if i set the center column width to "0" on that page (or would that create other problems)?

I never tried it but you would probably set the side bar widths to equal the width of the layout as I know of no way to set the center to 0 in the options. Let's both try it and report back the results.

My layout width was 990px and I had two sidebars at 200px so the center was 590px. I set the sidebars to 495px and that eliminated the center column where posts and pages would typically show. Makes for interesting layout possibilities.

Setting the sidebar width works (yeah!), but how can I make that apply to one page only (likely either my homepage or another page)? Thanks!

One thing that comes to mind is set the Outer Right and Outer left to the wide widths and have them set to only show on front page. Then set the Inner Right and Inner left to "normal" widths and have them show on everything but the front page.

You could also do this with widget areas but if this solution works it's easier.