This isn't a question, it's an answer. So happy I figured it out, maybe it'll be helpful to someone else. :-))

My original camcorder recordings were taken in wide-screen. I wanted the playback to more accurately represent what it would look like after rendered, so I set the project properties to 480x360, and then of course got the black horizontal bars across the top and bottom.

Then R-click on the event within the timeline, L-click on video event pan/crop, this causes the pan/crop tab to open. R-click again, this time within the pan/crop window, then select match output aspect. VOILA! :-))

But here's where I've really learned something: There's a portion of the video where I'm off too far to one side and in the cropped video, half my head is cut off. SOO in the event pan/crop window, there are some selections on the left. Select Position, then change the X-center to move the entire picture. This brings back my head, and simply cuts off a bit of the houseplant from the other side. Perfect!

I see there's a way to make the position-shift gradual over several frames too. Don't need that for this video, but how awesome that the option is there! I'll figure it out later if I need to. :-))

.....Susan