Cannot get anything to display

I have about 6 different sesctions that need to be displayed on the carousel. Each an image with a small piece of text to acompany it.

I have tried every variation of using sections, categories and uncategourised articles i can thing of but cannot get any information to display.

The only success i have had is the image only option.

Can you pleases suggest what structure I should be following, and any possible pit falls i may be falling into.

You are probably entering wrong section or category IDs. Are you sure that you are entering correct section, category or article IDs separated with commas?

ATM I have a carousel category in the home section, each carousel page is a seporate article under the carousel category.

I want all articles under the carousel category to be displayed so my source setting is content category
and content source id is 3 (the id of my carousel category) is this correct?

cracked it nothing displays if you have the category page open in admin while trying to view it on the live site.