need help connecting a laptop

I have a westell 6100 dsl modem and a friend has given me his old Linksys WRT54GC.

After some fiddling and searching through these forums i was able to connect to the internet using the EasyLink Connect software.

However, when i use the add another computer to network option, save to usbflash drive and try to setup on my laptop, it says it is unable to establish a wireless connection to the router.

in the taskbar of the laptop it says:

speed: 54.0 Mbps
signal strength: Excellent
status: connected

i may be connected but i cannot get to google. the laptop is a Toshiba Tecra S2 PM Centrino 2.0 1024/60 Combo Wifi XP it has some sort of "Connectivity Doctor" software already installed on it and while i am still n00b it says it has found 0 problems and am connected.

please help, thank you.