I can start my MySQL server with

# cd /usr/local/mysql
# bin/safe_mysqld --user=myuser --pass=mypass

Starting mysqld daemon with databases from /usr/local/mysql/data

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Then the server is started and it all works fine, the only thing is i can't just make a shell script and stick it in /etc/rc.d/rc.local because when it run those commands and it says its starting it just hangs there

so when i put it in rc.local it hangs while its booting up and i have to go into rescuse mode and fix it.

And when i try to launch /usr/local/mysql/bin/mysqld --user=root
i get
Fatal Error: Can't Open Privilege tables: Table 'mysql.host' doesn't exist

and i'm not sure what to put in that file

any help would be greatly appreciated

well do you not have a proper daemon script set up for mysql?

/etc/init.d/mysqld start

or such like. if that works add mysqld to your default runlevel. on redhat i think this should still be:

chkconfig --levels 3 5 mysqld on