I’m developing a site using a boxedart template, it’s at: http://cunkrich.home.bresnan.net/Dayspring/

I learned HTML back in the 90’s, and I’ve relied on that experience and Google searches to make this all work, but I’m not sure what language I am even using. Any help is greatly appreciated. I’ve beeing using the validator at validator.w3.org, and the one here. Here are the issues I am having:

1. No DOCTYE was specified in the template. I’ve tried several, including XHTML Strict/Loose, and not sure if any are correct. I’m not sure how many of the other errors I am getting are meaningful, since I don’t seem to have the correct DOCTYPE. Do I have to make any changes to the Content Type?
2. Is there any way I can eliminating the “tone” that I hear when I click on one of the tabbed menu items? I used one of the supplied “inner” files, so that it didn’t play the soundtrack during the flash animation, but this tone still remains. I don’t have a way to edit flash files. Is there another way? Ideally, there should be no sound at all.

Thanks a lot!

That doesn't look like a great starting place. It's a fixed-width design that breaks when the content won't fit in the space allotted to it.

As far as validating it, it looks like HTML 4.01 Transitional is your best bet, but it includes some non-standard markup that won't validate against any of the standard DTDs.