3 day nightmare

[PJ <af.gourmet@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

This is rather complicated, so please bear with me.
Running FreeBSD 7.0
Background: Originally installed MySql 6.08alpha (compiled from ports),
php5.27,phpMyAdmin3.10, php-mysql-5.27,php-gd-5.27 and eventually got
things working ok.
Problem: My ISP host is using MySql 5.0.37 and  phpMyAdmin 2.10.1 ; so,
I figure that I had better use  something "compatible" in developing  a
site.
Currently on FBSD Mysql50 is 5.0.67_1 and phpMyAdmin 3.1.0  -  assume
that installing these should make the MySql db work on the site as well
as on my local development serve...
I have gone through innumerable contortions for 3 days trying to install
the needed versions but the only thing that works (more or less) is Webmin.
I have checked and rechecked, installed and reinstalled Mysql, Php5,
phpMyAdmin and php5-mysql, php-gd2, etc. and all I get is nada.
info.php does not show mysql but it does show the pgsql and gd2 extensions.
the mysql.so module is in the extensions.ini file and the file location
is set in php.ini.
After installing phpMyAdmin there is no phpadmin database in MySql and I
cannot connect to phpadmin - error - Cannot access mysql module, check
php configuration.
I tried to clean out theFBSD server files of almost all files and
directories related to MySql, php5, phpmyadmin and then reinstalled
MySql50, php5, phpmyadmin as well as php5-mysql, php5-gd and php5-pgsql.
Both php5-mysql and php5-pgsql installed the required modules in the
extensions.ini directory - but the mysql module is not recognized by
info.php.
What am I missing here?  I can seek out and attach error files - but I
don't know where or what would give any indications of what is wrong.
mysqld seems to be runnin -
ps -waux  returns:
root   1482  0.0  0.1  3456  1384  ??  I     8:55AM   0:00.00 sh -c
((/usr/local/bin/safe_mysqld || /usr/local/bin/mysqld_safe) &)

root   1483  0.0  0.1  3456  1492  ??  I     8:55AM   0:00.01 /bin/sh
/usr/local/bin/mysqld_safe

mysql  1497  0.0  1.1 65860 22400  ??  I     8:55AM   0:03.28
/usr/local/libexec/mysqld --basedir=/usr/local --datadir=/var/db/mysq

root  66079  0.0  0.1  3308  1136  v0  S+   11:26AM   0:00.00 grep mysql

Is the datadir=/var/db/mysq correct or is it truncated?

HELP, please...