is there a problem with accessing the instance on the stage. Cause i can't seem to.

in the fla, a movieclip exists on the stage (no document class), this movieclip belongs to the class Main, inside this movieclip are three other movieclips, correctly referenced in Main. Now i have another class which is trying to access one of these movieclips, and i want to access the instance of Main to get them, but it wont work.

in Main: trace(parent == root) //true

trace(root.numChildren) //compiler error, undefined property

trace(stage.numChildren) // 1

trace(stage.getChildAt(0)) // root1

trace(stage["root1"]) //compiler error, undefined property

can someone please explain whats going on here.

stage says it has a child, its name: root1

root1 is the parent of the movieclip placed on the stage, class: Main

root1 says it has no children

how do i solve this?