I think that it was a cookie issue… after a number of different changes, uninstalls and reinstalls it seems to work fine. Not really sure what was going on but it seems to all work now… hopefully it stays that way… 
thanks though for the help… i am sure that i will have some further questions
thanks again
sorry about that. I did have it set up like that. (my spaces didnt show up in the post)
wordpress-instance ( http://www.examplesite.com )
>files with wp instance (ie wp-config.php, index.php, etc)
>[folder] wp-admin/
>[folder] wp-content/
>[folder] plugins/
>[folder] themes/
>[folder] myCustomTheme/
>[folder] index.php
>[folder] wp-includes
>[folder] bbpress instance (which i call ‘discussion-center’)
in this case in order to access my bbpress site i use:
http://www.examplesite.com/discussion-center
and that works, i can see it all and interact with both…but, once logged in however i can not access the wordpress admin panel, http://www.examplesite.com/wp-admin … just a white page… as well as http://www.exaplesite.com/wp-login.php… even if i remove the [folder] bbpress instance from my wordpress instance it still doesnt offer access for wordpress… i would try uninstalling it and reinstalling it but what else would i have to remove other than the instance folder?
thanks again for any help
