Animated GIF--Quality and File Size

I'm having a hard time getting a quality image and a decent file size.
Even if I save animated GIFs and open with PE an try to resave them, the motion is choppy and the file size is more than double the original.
For example, the following image is less than 10K and plays quite smoothely, but no way can I duplicate such a simple graphic under 10K:
http://thequackshack.com/forums/radio/style_images/Borderli-546/ad_banner.gif
It also seems that others can control the duration of frames individually...
Most of my GIFs end up around 300K, which will not be accepted. A compromise of poor quality will also not be considered.
What can I do?
I've tried lowering Dither and colors, but the results are poor. My graphics will not be used if they are so large or of poor quality.
Here is a couple that I made:
http://thequackshack.com/forums/radio/uploads/post-176-1135532612.gif
http://thequackshack.com/forums/radio/uploads/post-176-1135723565.gif
PSE3, WinXP Pro

Cuc
I am not an animation expert, but I copied two of your examples. On the example you say is under 10K, there are about 35 layers. On your example there are about 65 layers. I'm wondering if reducing the number of layers would get you what you want.
As for controlling duration of frames, I assume you want Frame 1 to be 0.5 second, Frame 2 to be 1 second etc. I think PSE puts a uniform time between frames. This can be adjusted, but it is adjusted all frames. One workaround I've seen is to copy a layer. So if the timing interval is 0.5 seconds, you would have the same image show for 0.5 seconds X 2 = 1 second.
This is about all I know on animated GIFS.

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