basic login using MySQL

[WorldInChaos]

Hello everyone, I have a simple task, yet I believe I'm overthinking it, or missing the obvious.

I am going to create user names and passes in a database table...
and then I want a user to have to login to a certain area of our site using them.
With this company, we will simply call them/email them their username and pass.

I believe I have to use a basic Select user FROM table WHERE user=$userid AND pass=$pass
then toss in a If statement for authentication...
do I have an return statement - and how do I actually know then login?
What prevents them from going straight to the page - do I have to define variables and send the url and POST user/pass?

I'm more confused on how to/if create the admin page - if it's necessary.  PHPMyAdmin does a fine job otherwise.

If you have rather simple code for an administrative front end, that's great, but not necessary, although it would be helpful if I could 'login' to a page in order to add entries, or view/print the entire database from a page.

This whole process doesn't have to be super-secure.  It is only so everyone under the sun doesn't fill out a certain form on our site.  Even if someone breaks in, the only thing they will see is a registration form for another part of a website.  ::)

This needs to be basic, I don't need any frills, and I know this has to have been done before.  If you have any code or suggestions, please post them!

Thanks!
Steve

[taith]

for example...

login.php
[code]
<?
if(!empty($_POST)){
$username=$_POST[username];
$password=md5($_POST[password]);
$result=mysql_query("SELECT * FROM users WHERE `username`='$username' AND `password`='$password' LIMIT 1");
$row=mysql_fetch_array($result);
if(!empty($row)) $_SESSION[user]=$row;
else die("Invalid Username/Password");
}
?>
[/code]

[WorldInChaos]

Thanks much.
I basically used that and some more input filtering.
Like I said, it was rather easy - I just needed my memory jogged.
Thanks for the help.

Steven.