Jeff - make sure you work thru the tutorials in the help files.  they have help files in the tutorials that are "hands on" they have you open tutorial projects and tell you step by step how to do things like this.

yeah... it sounds like you're starting to get it.... ask if you have any other issues with it. 

I'll make sure Beagle and Greg get right on it for you.  

Assuming I have to have at least 1 softsync track for every MIDI track that is going to "play" that instrument

 
Some soft synths, like Cakewalk's TTS-1, can accept input from 16 MIDI tracks with just one instance of the synth.
Others, like Cakewalk's Sound Center, can only accept input from 1 MIDI track at a time, so you would need to insert another instance of Sound Center for every MIDI track you want to use with that synth.