Sorry, just to close out the issue..
I found it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ok, I went through the web.config file line by line.
When I originally set up my install of DNN I remember having problems, so I changed something in there that really no one talks about, but it is obviously used for the encrytion/decryption of the user accounts.
This line in the web.config file:
<add name="AspNetSqlMembershipProvider" type="System.Web.Security.SqlMembershipProvider" connectionStringName="SiteSqlServer" enablePasswordRetrieval="true" enablePasswordReset="true" requiresQuestionAndAnswer="false" minRequiredPasswordLength="7" minRequiredNonalphanumericCharacters="0" requiresUniqueEmail="false" passwordFormat="Encrypted" applicationName="DotNetNuke" description="Stores and retrieves membership data from the local Microsoft SQL Server database"/>
I changed the "applicationName" value to the name of my LIVE server, thinking that would fix the problem that I had in the original install. That did it. When I changed that in the web.config file, I can now log in with the existing accounts.
Most people probably didn't change this value, which is why it isn't mentioned, but hopefully my dumb mistake helps someone else :-)
Thanks!