[geckoday]

I think you are working too hard. Instead of changing code all over the place, try this approach. In home.tpl add this before the third column HTML:

{if $main eq "catalog" and $current_category.category eq ""}

Then after the last line of the third column HTML in home.tpl add:

{/if}

Thats it. No php changes required, no chasing down links all over the place.

BTW, please add your version into your signature. Sometimes answers are very version dependent. My answer applies to versons 4.0.14 and 4.0.18 for sure and probably 4.1.x versions and earlier 4.0.x versions.