defeated by a button and a movieclip- please help

[PantherRun]

Hello, i'm the guy breaking down my 16000 frame movie into movieclips. Each movie clip is a page and on that page sits a forward and backward button. Hit the forward button and it loads the next movieclip in line, hit the back it reloads the previous movieclip.

My problem... getting those #@&*)%$ buttons to work.

On the root timeline, frame 1, i dragged an instance of my first Mc(1) and all worked fine under test movie. I then selected the forward button on that MC1's internal timeline and have tried various script to get it to load the instance of MC2 sitting on frame 2 of the root timeline.
All i get under test movie is a mad flashing of MC1, and output saying "Line 1: Clip events are permitted only for movie clip instances."

here's an example of scripting I've tried attaching to the MC's button...

on(release)
_root.gotoAndPlay(2)

I'm just not understanding what I'm missing (not surprised).
Please tell me if you're willing, and as precisely as you can, how i go about attaching the mc1's nested button to mc2 so that when the reader presses the mc1's button the second movieclip will load.

As always, thank the gods you're all here.

 

[oldnewbie]

Once again, trying to recreate a mockup .fla, from the little info you're giving is quite error prone. You should post a link to a "closest possible to the real thing" such .fla, so that our suggestions are not made in vain.

It should be zipped up and in a MX only format.