Hello again list, moderators, and responders!
As the OP, I want to mark this thread as solved as I now have what I wanted. I can live without the answer to my questions, some of which I will answer myself.
For the record let me clarify some of my network details. At the beginning of this thread I mentioned that I’m a recent DSL subscriber. Prior to that I used qinternet with an IF of modem0 that connected manually. Qinternet requires smpppd.
When DSL came, I switched to a qinternet IF of eth0 again connected manually. Smpppd is started at run levels 2,3,5, so I was comfortable adding those levels to sshd. Most likely the sshd start at boot isn’t necessary, but it’s working.
To me this thread is a success story. Thank you moderators for your help! Like my previous attempts to mark this thread solved, I’ll have to snipe at it, so there may be some collateral damage. Please cut me some slack! Heboland