I tried all the suggestions made by Robert, and seemed to get a step closer.
I still could not print locally, but when I sent a print from a Windows box,
the printer fired up and spat out a blank sheet. Encouraging all the same!

However, when I rebooted, eth0 was down, and could not be fired up! I went
back to rc.modules and uncommented everything regarding parallel port, and
that brought the network back up, so I figured there must be a problem in
that section of rc.modules.

Have edited rc.modules again, but still no joy. Machine is firing up OK,
Cups reports the printer is idle, but even cups (via Lynx :631) will not do
anything when I send a test page. Next step....try to re-install the
printer on CUPS I guess.

Rob