Make sure you have the xkb-data package from the Mer repo installed in addition to the Mer evdev package (I don't remember exactly what it was called or the version numbers)

Try installing synaptic...it might help with lining out the right package numbers.

nm-applet only seems to work in hildon (Mer). I consistently ran into issues with nm-applet and gnome-keyring-daemon when I tried using nm-applet. Other possibilities would include manually setting up the /etc/network/interfaces files (there is information about doing that around there and on the ubuntu forums). Also, there is a program called wicd which is supposed to be decent and might be worth a try.