Relative positioning with x AND y ? any ideas wanted

I’m looking to create something like the link below,
http://www.learningactionscript3.com/2008/05/13/the-power-of-relative-positioning/

however I need it to work on both x and y,
I’ve been trying for days to figure out a way to pull this off,

can anyone point me to a tutorial or an example of something along those lines?

thanks in advance for any help…