Thanks very much for all the advice. When I was browsing ebay for LE 9 I actually came across a seller selling the download of LE 8 plus upgrade plus activation code for £40, which seemed much more reasonable than others i'd seen, and fast as it was a download rather than waiting for a disk.
I purchased it, followed the instructions and am now up and running on my macbook with the 003. So I am delighted, and excited to get started!
I will probably be back with more questions!! and once again thank you both for the advice
