You're violating the entire principle of HTML::Template in that code, that module is about removing all HTML from the perl script :). If you want to embed the HTML, I'd suggest you look at Template::Toolkit, HTML::Mason, or embed_perl which are all execellent modules.

With HTML::Template you'd want to use a <TMPL_LOOP ...> in your template file to generate the options. There are a few ways to approach the "selected", the easiest would be to also have a <TMPL_IF ...>selected</TMPL_IF> in the template triggered by the comparison in the script.

There's an HTML::Template help list you can subscribe to listed at the end of the POD for the module. Also check out the others listed, TMTOWTDI and YMMV with each.

Update:

As requested, a sample of what you'd want to do with this mod.

<!-- foo.tmpl -->

...
<select name="dropdown">
  <tmpl_loop name="menu">
    <option value="<tmpl_var name="item">" <tmpl_if name="selected">se
+lected</tmpl_if>><tmpl_var name="item">
  </tmpl_loop>
</select>
...
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### foo.pl ###

my @menu;
push @menu, { item => $_, selected => $_ eq $state } for 1..6;
$t->param( menu => \@menu );
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I love the idea of the module though the implementation can get a little yucky (tags in tags). I've been mucking around inside the module to play with different techniques for subbing in vars and you can customise it quite a bit (right now I'm mainly just suceeding in breaking it though :). Anyways, just incase that's too condenced for you I expanded the script part a bit (longer version not tested).

my @nums = (1..6);
my (@menu, %option, $selected);

foreach $x (@nums) {

  # Set selected to true if the state equals the current item.
  if ($state eq $x) {
    $selected = 1;
  }
  else {
    $selected = 0;
  }

  # Tell the option the item value and whether it's selected.
  my %option = { item => $x,
                 selected => $selected };

  # Put the option in the menu.
  push @menu, \%option;
}

# Send the menu to the template;
$t->param( menu => \@menu );
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