[cellarius]

You're perfectly right, and though I did that about 200 times (at least it feels like that...) I always missed that oh so simple snippet of code right at the end:

<script type="text/javascript">
<!--
    // Main vBulletin Javascript Initialization
    vBulletin_init();
//-->
</script>

Everything was there all the time - I just forgot to start the engine

If anybody should ever be so stupid, too, I thought I share the solution to the mystery

Thanks for your patience and help - what an emerassement this thread is (for me of course)