dell inspiron 1501 wlan not working

new laptop, windows crashed, so i put ubuntu on it.
 lspci = broadcom corp. bcm94311mcg wlan mini-PCI (rev 01)
iwconfig shows it as IEE 802.11g, acess point not associated.
iwlist scanning shows no scan results for wlan0

i had a similar problem with a compaq presario c500 that was resolved by writing a custom script (the "temporary fix" script set to run at start up)

alas, i did not write the script, my friend did, and i cant contact him at the moment. im a new ubuntu user, and am still learning to use the terminal as a powerful tool (unlike DOS) so if anyone could tell me what to do and explain why that fixes it, i would be greatly appreciated, but if you just want to fix it and not tell me what is going on i wont complain.

Thx,
!~ALT~!