About retrieving auto increment value

Hi I have the typical problem with retrieving auto increment value in php-mysql environment. I have search info in mysql page and I have found LAST_INSERT_ID() funtion but I don't know how to use correctly. I have one script that insert a row. And another script that must retrieve last auto_increment value for primary key on a table. I want something like this: SELECT LAST_INSERT_ID() FROM foo_table; (like curval(foo_sequence) in postgres) This doesn't work. It's possible? Where I am wrong? Thanks in advance -- Marc Soler