Thanks to all who answered. I knew that I was close, but that only counts in horseshoes I guess. I also got some good alternative coding suggestions from some of you, too, so again, my thanks and appreciation to all of you for helping out a newbie here. Now I just need to sit down and start reading the perldocs for fun - might help me to remember something next time I get one of these little gems of a problem. ;-)

Originally posted as a Categorized Answer.