Arduino Duemilanove - Atmega8 standalone serial communication

Hi,

I'm trying to drive a GLCD for a project. Since I need as many pins as possible on the Duemilanove, I came up with the idea of using an Atmega8 to control the display. It works fine: really accurate, nice speed... The problem is that I can't send any data through my Duemilanove via RX/TX pins (0 and 1).
I wrote a quick program, just to test it: the emitter sends 1 and 2, with a delay of 1 second between them. If the receiver gets 1, lights up a LED. If it's a 2, it switches it off.
It's strange that the TX/RX on-board SMD LEDs on the Duemilanove just blink when I've opened the "Serial Monitor" on the Arduino IDE. However, they don't blink if I close it. I suppose I'm missing something, but I though that the data sent via Serial is also sent trough the pins 0 and 1.

Any advice?

Thanks.

I solved the problem; it was just a burnt resistor at reset pin... T__T