Please have a little patience when asking for support. We all help here voluntarily.
Your question is a fairly common one and some forum searching would probably answer your question. As for not being able to connect, you need to try to be more specific in explaining your issue. Otherwise, people are less likely to help out because your issue is too vague.
Not being able to connect could be multiple issues:
1. The server you are trying to connect to isn't allowing public connections. Try another server.
2. If you tried multiple servers and can connect to none of them, then you have an issue on your side.
3. If you live in a dorm or are playing at work, you might be using a proxy that is blocking port 5998, which means you won't be able to connect.
4. If you are running a P2P or Torrent program, it might be using all of your bandwidth. Try turning them all off.
5. You may have a firewall that is blocking EQ. Disable all firewalls.
6. If you are running a Dual Core CPU or Windows Vista, you will probably need to read the following post and apply at least one of the fixes listed in it:
http://www.eqemulator.net/forums/showthread.php?t=25327
7. You may need to adjust your Windows Desktop and/or your Everquest Resolution settings.
And there are other reasons as well. So, you can see why being more specific can help us to help you. This also explains why people were probably reluctant to post a reply to help, because there is no simple short answer to your problem. Reading the forums and searching can help a lot, and being as descriptive as possible also helps us to define your problem better.