Could someone explain How to configure Redhad Linux 9 to get online?

Help! I'm a computer illiterate who's only experiences is using Window
wizards to configure my computer. Could someone help? I have a home
network with two computers , one running Win XP and the other dual boot Win
98 SE and Redhat 9.0. The computers are connected to the internet via a
cable modem thru Linksys Befsr41. The "problem" computer is a Compaq 4532
(Win 95 which I installed Win 98 and Linux) with an Netgear AE201 ethernet
board I also upgraded to a 20GB hard drive.
During boot up in Linux there's an error :
"Cannot activate network device eth0! Determining IP information for
eth0...no chain/targert/matchs that name failed
iptables: Bad rule(does a matching rule exist in that chain?)
Another error I get after starting the browser and typing 192.168.1.1
there's the error "connection was refused when attempting to connect
192.168.1.1 Device"
When configuring do I have it auto find dhcp? or set the statically IP
address? Which address do I use 192.x.x.x,24.x.x.x or 68.x.x.x.x? What I
can figure is the 192 is the home network computers addresses, the 24 is the
Linksys router address and the 68 is the ISP address. Is the 192 my LAN and
the 24 my WAN? and the 68 my destination?
Under Linux Network configuation "wizard" under DNS
Hostname: localhost.localdomain
Primary DNS: 192.168.1.1
Send DNS : (leave blank?)
Tentary DNS: (leave blank?)
DNS Search Path: localdomain (correct or do I give my ISP.com?)
Under Host window I have 127.0.01 IP address localhost.localdomain
(Names) localhost (Address)
Do I need to make changes in Security? NIS? LDAN ? etc ???
Under Window all is fine. My computer doesn't "see" my Linux Partition if
that has anything to do with my problem.
Thanks for any suggestions.