Curve Text !

Hello! For the longest time I've been trying to figure out (personally and internetically) how to *bend* or *curve* text (type). Even after rendering and using the Polar Opposites filter my efforts were futile. I was also exposed to a method that involved adding letters one-by-one to the surface of a circle, but there have to be better ways.
Help me Mr.Photoshopkenobi, you're my only hope!!!

Zandriuska,
The quick answer? Upgrade to version 6.0! You'll be glad you did. This is a feature that Photoshop could have used for a while. Like you I spent a few years trying to find a good way to do this. I rendered and rotated letters individually but that takes way to long. I even created the desired effect in the much hated Quark XPress one time; took a huge screenshot of it, then selected the text from the screenshot in Photoshop!
To get to your question, here's a suggestion you can do with pre-6.0 Photoshop. Have you tried using displacement maps to distort your text? Displace is one of the Distort effects in Photoshop's Filter Menu. What you do is pick an image, apply the Displace Filter, then pick another image that will be used to distort the first. Read both my tutorials on the subject if you'd like to learn more. With a little practice you should be able to create image maps that will alter your text as you'd like.