Newbie needs help! '>' closing PHP Tag

Greetings fellow devs! I am new to PHP (having tried my hand at running ASP/SQL here at the house. No, I didnt chose ASP, it just happened to be the software I had when I decided to mess with dynamic content. My problem is probably really simple. I am learning to use PHP via online documents and the first examply I am trying to implement is a simple clock. My script is fine up to the point I have: if ($hours > 12) { $hours=$hours-12; $ampm="PM"; } The '>' prior to 12 closes my '<?php' tag and the results return 12) {... on. If there a way I can use the greater-then and NOT close the damn tag? Any help would be greatly appreciated. (As well as any links to good tutorials/code examples for any aspect of using PHP/MySQL/Apache). Thanks in advance, Marc