well you're in luck with Flash 5, the actionscript is based on the same ECMA standards javascript is!

for the flip on/off, try using on(release) instead of on press, and just flip a boolean.

here's what I do when I want to run series is select mcs:

actionArray = new Array(2,4,6,7);
for (z=0;z<actionArray.length;z++)
{
eval("_root.A"+actionArray[i]).gotoAndPlay(8);
}

You just have an array that defines the ones you want to flip, and for loop through that array!

cheers!