[jQuery] validate with changing default submit

[mike]

I am a novice at jquery/javascript.

I am trying to use validate plugin and then make a ajax request with
post() and I am thoroughly confused by the submitHandler option

Here's what I have:

The html
------------
<form id="mail_form" name="mail_form" method="post" action="xxx.php" >
// many form elements here using validate plugin
<input class="submit" type="submit" id="mail_button" value="Submit"  /
>
</form>
// where xxx.php is NOT what I want to have executed because I don't
want a page refresh.

The jquery stuff
---------------------
$(document).ready(function(){
   $('#mail_form').validate();

   $('#mail_form').submit(function() {
  var formData = $('#mail_form').serialize();
  $.post('mailer.php',formData,processResponse);
  function processResponse(data,status) {
    if(status='success') {
        $('#zone1').html(data);
        } else {
        $('#zone1').html('<p class="message_text">An error has occured.</
p>');
        }
  }
});

I want to execute mailer.php.  I understand I should use the
submitHandler: but I have no idea how to do it and retain the usage of
serialize and post().

The documentation for this case says:

$(".selector").validate({
   submitHandler: function(form) {
        $(form).ajaxSubmit();
   }
})

but looking at the docs for ajaxSubmit seems to get orders of
magnitude more complicated.  Suggestions?  Thanks.

Mike