Q: Do I need my cookie loading to occur before my at the very top of my page? Sorry my brain is shutting down at the moment I thought I knew this shit lol.
A: Code inside tags is processed server-side... that means it gets handled before anything is sent to the user. The doctype declaration is client-side, meaning it gets processed by the user's browser after you send it to him. Php code can go anywhere, and it will be processed before the user receives and processes the html, unless you have something really wacky going on. Try it out and see if it works. Best of Luck, -Jess