the usage of #example

Overthere

I have notice in the examples the following:

editor = new $.fn.dataTable.Editor( {
"ajax": "../php/staff.php",
"table": "#example",

or this:

$('#example').DataTable( {
dom: "Bfrtip",
ajax: "../php/staff.php",
columns:

I was wondering if my problem was the #example - is that an alias for the actual table in the database? I view staff.php and see actual values for db, table etc and so I was wondering about it.
No matter what I do, I can not pull my data from my database - and I don't receive an error...any clues?

jLinux

example is the CSS Selector for the HTML table..