How do  I do a backup using a disk image file and SuperDuper?

The external drive won't mount on the desktop even though the power light shows up on the external drive case. I want to back up the files on the computer, Powerbook G4 Panther in a hurry as the computer keeps shutting down on me.
I opened up SuperDuper which I normally use for backups and there was a message that said it couldn't find the drive or something like that. Then there was a window to choose where I was copying from, and it came up with the hard drive name. Then another window came up with a disk image icon which is the place to copy to. I named it "Copyofharddrive", but I am not sure if this is right. I then pressed "Click" and then it told me it was going to erase the volume "Copyofharddrive" and asked if that was OK.
I am scared of doing the wrong thing and erasing my hard drive. I only have 12GB left on my hard drive too. I am trying to copy 100GB of data onto the disk image file. Will that work out?
I have never done this before. I don't understand disk image files. I just want to back up the data so that if the computer or the hard drive crashes I can then put the files on another computer.
Is a disk image a suitable way to do a backup and can I restore the hard drive exactly as it was on the hard drive on another hard drive using the disk image? Do I have enough space on the Powerbook to do the backup? Am I following the correct steps in doing the backup on Superduper? Why does it ask me if it's OK to erase the volume "Copyofharddrive" when I jsut created it?
Thanks for all your help.

If you only have 12 GBs of space on your hard drive then how will you fit 100 GBs of data into a disc image file on that hard drive?
If your external drive is not functioning then you cannot do any kind of backup to it. And, you cannot backup your hard drive to your hard drive.
What you need is another external hard drive with at least 100 GBs or more of free space that you could use for a backup. However, if you have the unpaid version of SuperDuper, then SD will erase the backup drive before making a full clone of your internal drive.

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