Audacity Part 1

This assignment has been the most challenging and the most enjoyable.  We were to create a podcast with different soundbites intermixed with our own commentary using Audacity.  I chose to create a podcast on my evolution through "musical evolution" and incorporated several different song clips and two separate interviews from artists I enjoy.  I've never had any experience with any type of software like this but once I began playing around with it I found it to be fun.  I spent a lot of time just getting lost playing around with cutting up sound bites and clipping songs.  Once we finished our project we were to download LAME in order to convert our project to an MP3 file so that we would be able to publish it.  This is where I am currently stuck.  I have been battling this program for two evenings now.  Either it doesn't want to work with me or I'm being to dense to work with it at the moment.  I've read all of the instructions, watched numerous tutorials, and read my classmates posts on the discussion boards for guidance but can't seem to get the thing to cooperate.  It's frustrating to say the least but it doesn't overshadow the enjoyment I've had completing this project.  I'm hoping to get this thing figured out before my time is up tonight and get my podcast posted.