XML thumbnail gallery problem

Hi!
I have a specific request, I did the XML thumbnail gallery tutorial that I found
very useful!

Now I’d like to use only text in the first image and would like to get rid of the thumbnail. Even if I delete it from the xml it appears as a blank space thumbnail until i start scrolling.

Does anybody know how to tell the code to skip the first thumbnail?

Thanks!!!

Added: I think becouse of the thumbnail spacing also the first one gets a space?