Having Some Trouble Connecting To A Database....

I am doing one of the Microsoft virtual labs "Creating ASP.NET Web Applications with C# - Part 2" using Visual Web Developer Express. I am trying to fill a gridview with database information, but it gives me the error
"An error has occurred while establishing a connection to the server.  When connecting to SQL Server 2005, this failure may be caused by the fact that under the default settings SQL Server does not allow remote connections. (provider: Named Pipes Provider, error: 40 - Could not open a connection to SQL Server)".
This is on the local machine that I am executing the code.
 public void BindGrid(string sortfield)
{
//Create DataAdapter to fetch data from Prodcuts table
SqlDataAdapter myCommand = new SqlDataAdapter("select * from Products", myConnection);
//Create dataset and fill it with Product data
DataSet ds = new DataSet();
myCommand.Fill(ds, "Products");
//Bind Product data to Datagrid
DataView Source = ds.Tables["Products"].DefaultView;
Source.Sort = sortfield;
dgProducts.DataSource = Source;
dgProducts.DataBind();
} 
It stops on the line "myCommand.Fill(ds, "Products"); and points out the error mentioned earlier. I am not sure what to do...any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks in advance, and I apologize as well if I have not pointed out enough information.