Troubleshooting Postgres7.4

[Bobb Shields <dudomann@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi all.  

I'm running 7.4, and I recently did a few upgrades, which seem to have
broken it.  I believe that all of them were php updates. 
Anywho, my service configuration shows that postmaster is
stopped.  I can't find an instance of it in my system monitor.

Can you help me to figure out if its still running, and if its not, why it won't start like it should?

Sorry for the lack of information.  Yell at me if you need more.
  I'm relatively new to linux, so I'm trying to learn, and the
wealth of information on the net is a bit overwhelming.  

Thanks in advance,
~Bobb