I didn't mean to talk you down, I was just trying to give you some good advice how to code websites. I did not know whether you're using a doctype or not but I do have to recommend it as a first thing. I guess I could add "if you don't have it" at the end. However, you shouldn't have anything before the doctype. Unfortunately, IE gets confused if you have the <xml> declaration before it, so you'd better remove that. Also, you have some random characters which might confuse browsers.
Point two still stays. Absolute positioning should definitely not be used here. It might work fine, but it is best avoided. You could make good steaks on the hood of the car, but it might not be the best idea to do so.
Point three as well. Looking at the snippet you gave, left and top declarations play no role. Why not omit them then. It's good to know how things work and what makes them work and just specify what you want and not a bunch of arbitrary information.