Thank you for your prompt response. Based upon the info you provided I was able to get the sprite generation issue sorted out. The sprite has been generated and now resides in the images/sprites directory.
On to the next issue. I made the template edits in a test style but the status icons do not display on forumhome. The test style is user selectable (testing sprites) if you would like to take a look to see if you can determine what I've done to break your very useful mod
The link is:
http://www.browncafe.com/forum/
I just took a look at the sprite-css templates and they are all empty. Is that working as intended or was I supposed to put some css in there myself?