javascript menus not appearing in their layer except in ie

pwd

Here's the code:

[HTML]<div id="menu layer" style="position:absolute; width:596px; left: 161px; height:18px; top: 11px; z-index:1">
<script language="JavaScript1.2" src="../scripts_and_stylesheets/coolmenus4.js">
</script>
<script language="JavaScript1.2" src="../scripts_and_stylesheets/content_menusb.js">
</script>
</div> [/HTML]

here's the page (this is very much in development just showing it to show the effect I'm after)

http://peterdungan.net

open it in ie and it looks like I want it to
open it in firefox or opera and the menus appear in the top left, not in the div layer.
why's that?

pwd

I was neglecting to set a property in the menu script to set its position. Know how to fix it now.