How it works
The Blogger Beta template uses -tags for several "wrappers".
The header is inside the Header-wrapper. The sidebar is inside the Sidebar-wrapper. The main section is inside the Main-wrapper, and the footer is inside the Footer-wrapper. Main-wrapper and Sidebar-wrapper are inside the Content-wrapper.
And Header, Content, and Footer are surrounded by the Outer Wrapper.
The code looks like this:
<div id='outer-wrapper'>
<div id='header-wrapper'>
<b:section id='header' class='header' ....>
</div>
<div id='content-wrapper'>
<div id='main-wrapper'>
<b:section id='main' class='main' ....>
</div>
<div id='sidebar-wrapper'>
<b:section id='sidebar' class='sidebar' ....>
</div>
</div>
<div id='footer-wrapper'>
<b:section id='footer' class='footer' ....>
</div>
</div>
You will easily recognize this structure from your template.
You can add a left-sidebar in 3 easy steps:
Add a new wrapper for the left-sidebar to your template, inside the content-wrapper and in front of the main-wrapper.
Add a new section inside this wrapper, with a unique ID (for example leftsidebar) and set its class to 'sidebar'.
This is the code:
<div id='leftsidebar-wrapper'>
<b:section id='leftsidebar' class='sidebar' preferred='yes'/>
</div>
In the head of your template add css-code for a #leftsidebar-wrapper element, and set it to float left.
Adjust the width of your sidebars and your main-wrapper to fit the screen.
Editing your new sidebar
Now go to the layout-editor, and you will see the new sidebar to the left in your Page Elements Screen, and you can add new page elements to your new sidebar.
Make sure to backup your template first
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