Down state for buttons showing active links

hi there folks!
i’m trying to get my buttons to stay in a “down state” for the current page so the view knows which section of the site he’s in. i’ve seen this done using an _alpha command in which you just dim the button for the active link. is there a way to do it without using alpha so you can use a different color or something?

the reason i ask is because i’m going from gray buttons to orange buttons which show the “down” state and i’d like the buttons to stay orange for each section and then turn back to gray when the viewer moves on.

i’m using MC/buttons for it right now and it works, but i’m having troubles getting my MC/buttons to load anything else.

your help will be much appreciated!

goby