Instance Name Problem

Hi, I have an irritating problem.

I am creating a menu _root.slidingMenu within this I have a movie clip with an instance name of slidingMenu1 but I cannot get action script to address it properly?

When I trace(this); I get _root.slidingMenu.instance13

Has anyone any ideas why this is happening?

I have tried all the obvious things.
eg. checked that the instance name is correct,
checked that I have not added the instance name to the wrong mc.

Thanks

it sounds to me like you have a path issue instead of a naming issue. Are you sure that nothing else is naming the item? For example are you attaching the clip from the library?