jQuery to PHP data transfer

Hi, everyone. I’m a relatively new developer with limited experience in jQuery AJAX and PHP. I’m working on a plugin that is very much a learning exercise for me as well.

Basic description: On my plugin’s admin page, I have a bunch of forms that will be displayed as modal windows (using jQuery UI) and when filled out, will submit their fields to a separate PHP file for processing. That file will accept the data and prepare it for insertion into the wpdb table I have set up.

Plugin Admin page (PHP):

<div id="form1" title="My Awesome Form">
	<form id="frmNewCom">
		<fieldset>
		<table>
			<tr>
				<td><label for="name">Community Name</label>
				<td><input type="text" name="newComName" id="newComName" />
			</tr>
			<tr>
				<td><label for="lefthead">Left Column Header</label></td>
				<td><input type="text" name="newComLefthead" id="newComLefthead" /></td>
			</tr>
			<tr>
				<td><label for="righthead">Right Column Header</label></td>
				<td><input type="text" name="newComRighthead" id="newComRighthead" /></td>
			</tr>
		</table>
		</fieldset>
	</form>
</div>

jQuery UI code for form ($pcal is my no-conflict thing):

$pcal('#form1').dialog({
		autoOpen: false,
		height: 275,
		width: 400,
		modal: true,
		buttons: {
			"Add Living Option": function() {
				// Functionality for submit
			},
			Cancel: function() {
				$pcal(this).dialog("close");
			}
		},
		close: function() {
			// close function
		}
	});

Now here’s the problem. I’m not really sure what to do from this point. I’ve read a bunch of stuff about using .post() and .serialize(), and I’ve gotten myself very confused at this point.

Do you guys have some insight into the proper javascript/jQuery to PHP handling you could lend? Any and all help is appreciated.