dead keys don't work on my FC3, running on Gnome.

I set my keyboard to brazilian ABNT2, does not matter if I use system-config-
keyboard or setxkbmap to do the work. I type ' ` " ^ and nothing happens. ' 
followed e gives me e instead of é.
I also tried different keyboard layouts (german, english internatinal), I 
could not get dead keys to work.

So I changed my system to run IIIM on level 5, put the new input method 
switcher up in the bottom panel. Using that I set my input to Latin (unitle), 
now when I hit ' it opens a floating window with a list of option. This is 
horrible, my whole life I used ' followed by e to get é, now I suppose to 
hit ', wait a list to come up, then type the number of the option I want. Even 
worse, the option I want (é) is not in the list!

That is how input method is supposed to work now ? I'm missing something 
simple ?

Thanks