MovieClip Transition Problem

programming flash
1 
this.onRelease = function() {
		if (_root.currSection == undefined) {
			_root.currSection = "areas";
			_root.container.attachMovie("areas","areasSection_mc",_root.getNextHighestDepth());
			trace(_root.currSection);
		} else if (_root.currSection != "areas") {
			_root.currSection.alphaTo(0,0.8,"linear",0);
			if (_root.currSection._alpha==0) {
				_root.currSection = "areas";
				_root.container.attachMovie("areas","areasSection_mc",_root.getNextHighestDepth());
			}
			trace(_root.currSection);
		}
		_root.welcomeBg.alphaTo(0,0.8,"linear",0,function () {
		_root.welcomeBg._visible = false;
		});

	};

There is my code. I have it attached to 6 different buttons. Basically, I am trying to get each previous loaded MC section to fade before it loads the new selected section. I threw in the trace to see if it was loading the section, and it’s not. So the problem is definitely with my if statement, it’s not able to declare that the MC alpha is 0…

I hope all this makes sense, thanks in advance for any help.