Charlie,
The stack is for LOCAL memvars when you exit a routine variables on the stack just disappear when the stack pointer is restored to the callers stack frame. The heap is usually used for large things because stack space is usually limited to 64k.
>To satisfy my curiosity, I've made the commitment to learn C++. The book I'm studying talks a lot about allocating memory on the stack and on the heap. While I understand the implications of doing such, the book never really says when it is more appropriate to use the stack or the heap. So, under what conditions should I use the stack and what conditions should I use the heap?