Elk,

I feel your pain. When I was riding my mountain bike, it had the numbers on the gear shifters. Turns out the numbers are not the same for every bike - with some 1 is easy and 6 is hard . . . for others it is the opposite. And then, with road bikes, guess what? NO NUMBERS!

So, my suggestion to you is to TRY not to fixate on the numbers (easier said than done - I got stuck on them, but really it did just make everything a lot more difficult). Go by feel. In which gears does your pedaling feel easy (less resistance)? In which gears does your pedaling feel more difficult (have more resistance)? Generally, you want to be in a gear with less resistance when going uphill and more resistance on the flats and downhills. On downhills, I want to be in my big front chainring and my littlest back cog (sounds like you have a triple in front - the big ring creates the most resistance, and the little chainring creates the least resistance; it's opposite in the back - bigger equals less resistance and smaller equals more resistance). Be careful not to cross-chain (big in front and big in back or little in front and little in back) as this will create "chain rub" (you'll be able to hear it and it isn't good for your chain). On uphills I want to be in my middle front chainring or for really steep grades, I may go all the way down to my "granny gear," which is the smallest chainring in the front. If I was way down in those low resistance gears on the flats or downhill I'd be spinning like crazy and not getting much forward speed at all (or even lose speed).

I hope this makes a little bit of sense. Just keep practicing. Pushing really hard gears (lots of resistance) can be hard on the muscles and joints, so the "rule of thumb" is to find a gear in which you can easily spin at approximately 90-95 rpms.

Here's a Sheldon Brown article you may find helpful:

http://www.sheldonbrown.com/gears.html