SQL 2000 SP4 On Win2K3 Cluster

Hey there I am an SQL noob, our bank has no real SQL Admin, we had onw that left but never had a good knowledge transfer. We have 2 SQL servers clustered. IBSQL1 and IBSQL2 they make up cluster IBSQL. We have 2 other servers IBIIS1 ans IBIIS2 and we noticed when installing apps on them that they could not see the database. Yet it can ping IBSQL. The problem is on IBSQL1 and 2 port 1433 is not listening or open. Thus on IBSQL it isn't either of course. I have read of all kinds of people having this issue and most have said you need to manually add a connection string "Provider=sqloledb;Data Source=machineName,1433;Initial Catalog=xx;User ID=xx;Password=xx" Problem is I do not know how to add a connection string.

I need step by step instructions since im new to this. Start/programs/etc..... Apparently it is not enough to open the properties of tcp/ip in the config util and say 1433. You need to reenforce it by adding that string.

As it stands I cannot "telnet ibsql 1433" it tells me to take a hike basically.

So is the connection string the likely cause? or could it be something simpler? Thanks in advance.