Yes, there is a lot of good and interesting info on the site, but I did not register . . . it's much trouble to get my employing company to register for me and pay the subscription fee, and I need the info quickly. Nonetheless, I found out that my problem with the object reference error message was that I need to register the skin object in my .ascx skin file. After I had done that, then I could use <dnn:HOUSEMENU etc. etc.> with no problem.
But then now my menu is displaying all messy, with all sorts of bullets and big space in between menu items. Now I gotta find out how I can style it properly. Sigh . . . every step is such a struggle!!! 
I had looked at Inventua's menu modules, but they don't seem to offer what I need . . . which is a graphical representations for menu items. I've been looking long and hard, but it seems that there isn't anyone out there who is making a module or skin object for this, even though there have been people voicing the same need before. Look at this thread I started about using images in menus if you are so inclined . . .
http://www.dotnetnuke.com/Community/ForumsDotNetNuke/tabid/795/forumid/109/threadid/115508/scope/posts/Default.aspx
Thanks again for your contribution.
jc