>>ASP.NET v1.1 (VS.Studio 2003)

Well, the mystery is solved. My knowledge of ASP.NET certainly went up a notch or two.

I developed te whole app in VS 2005 (ASP.NET 2.0) as it has a better environment, editor, debugger, etc. As I cannot deploy internally until it is released (no Beta allowed in production servers), I retrofitted the app to VS 2003 temporarily. It took some adjustments and everything worked fine until I added the LinkButtons I mentioned.

Turns out that I had copied the aspx page and code from a working 2.0 page into a 1.1 project blindly and unknowingly overwriting the Web Form Designer generated code:

#region Web Form Designer generated code
override protected void OnInit(EventArgs e)
{
   //
   // CODEGEN: This call is required by the ASP.NET Web Form Designer.
   //
   InitializeComponent();
   base.OnInit(e);
}

That is why InitializeComponent() wasn't triggering. I understood that it wasn't triggering. I just didn't know why. After countless new white hairs were generated I figured it out. As a first time ASP.NET project it did not cathc my eye that the section was missing, until I compared with a brand new generated project and saw the code.\

Thanks for your patience. Now I need a drink!