DIVs sizing

Hi,

the questions sounds stupid to me, but I've spent hours googling for an answer without any solid result. I need to create a 3column web page. I don't want to use JS or "table" for creating the layout - just pure CSS. Left and right columns are fixed width positioned just next to page borders. So, let's say something like

#left_column{
position: absolute;
top: 0px;
left: 0px;
width: 200px;
}
 
#right_column{
position: absolute;
top: 0px;
right: 0px;
width: 200px;
}

No problem so far.

Problem 1 - Middle column has to be positioned between them, fully filling the gap, which is for sure dependent on browser window size

#middle_column{
position: absolute;
top: 0px;
left: 200px;
width: ??????;
}

Problem 2 - All of the 3 columns have to have the same height, equal to the highest of them. As their content is not known to me during the design phase, I cannot use something like height: XXXpx; for all of them, where XXX will be same number.

Please, can anybody help me, how to solve this issue with pure CSS? Or is TABLE only way out of this?

Marek