All of the text in my blog is default text (Times maybe)... the main content area and sidebars. Shouldn't I just be able to set the value of the font-family in "Body Style"?

Here's what I have there now:

font-family: tahoma, arial, sans-serif;
font-size: 0.8em;
color: #000000;
background: #ffffff;

Yes that would be the right place. I just tried and it worked. I.e.

font-family: georgia, serif;
font-size: 0.8em;
color: #000000;
background: #ffffff;

I just tried this:

font-family: georgia, serif;
font-size: 0.8em;
color: #000000;
background: #ffffff;

It didn't work. I am on WP 2.6.3 - does that matter?

I tried on 2.6.2 and it worked again. You're using Atahualpa 3.1 right ?

This is where I put the changes: "Body, Text & Links" -> "Body Style"

How did you upgrade to 3.1? Maybe some old files were not overwritten?

Yes. 3.1. Just downloaded. I did not upgrade... this is a different blog.

To get the font to change in my posts for example, I had to change "div.post-bodycopy" in styles.css.php. But that didn't change it for links so I have had to change it in "a:link, a:visited, a:active"... etc. etc. Obviously I can't keep this up. Any ideas why it doesn't work in BODY?

By the way, I am using the Web Developer Toolbar for Firefox so I can edit CSS and see the changes without going through the whole process of save-refresh over and over again... I have changed the value of font-family inside the BODY tag in the css and even gone as far as deleting the font-family attribute all together - - it has absolutely no effect on the body font whether the attribute is there or not.

Checking something brb

... O.k. I thought not work on hosts where magic_quotes_gpc is OFF but it works. I found one error though, the unchecking/checking sidebars on/off doesn't stick however everything else seems to stick. I could not replicate your error though.

The sidebar issue is fixed, I am uploading a new version within minutes