Ok Linux Geeks - Help Needed

Ok, I love OSS... LOVE the shit. I currently run an XP system with 90% of my day to day software being OSS... I just love it.

But there is one Open Source dive I've never been able to fully take.. .the operating system itself. I've tried 3 or 4 times to use a Linux system (Mandriva and Red Hat mostly). It all goes fine as long as I'm using the packages that come with the distro, but then comes my brick wall : installing something new.

Here's my current conundrum. I've got Red Hat installed on this old PII laptop I got for $25. I want to install a program (package?) called Wired (link). Now I get as far as to unzip the tarball and all, but when I check out the install file it requires a dozen or so dependencies... and who knows how many dependencies they need... and so on. Is there an easier way to do this, because I could be all night here trying to install this one program, or is this just the nature of the beast?

People are regularly touting the wonder that is Linux to me, but this is a little peev I have with the OS that has kept me from switching over. If I could overcome this, I'd probably have switched over over a year ago.

Anyone got some good resources for me? Oh and go slow... pretend I'm your grandma, 'cause this stuff tends to get over my head.