help for an old problem

Please can anyone help me.
I have been trying to put a table either side of my forum so i can members can see what is going on in my site. I have created a lefthand nav table and a righthand nav table. I then went into the header page in the forum and tried to insert the code for the tables but try as i might i cannot get the tables to site either side of the forum. I have successfully added a top and a footer but now I am stuck. I think i might be putting the code in the wrong place or i have missed an important bit of code. I have had this problem for a few years now and unfortunately don't seem to get anywhere. Please has anyone else had this problem? I am at my wits end. This is a not-for-profit site. queensah