The Gnucash database?

[Dale Alspach]

When you started gnucash did you let the druid create a set of accounts for you?
If so you should have a checking account register. When you write a check, you create an
entry just as you would in a paper check register in your checkbook with one extra step: you
must designate some other account(s) for the debit side of the transaction. While using the
check register you are not seeing the possibly hundreds (thousands) of other transactions in the
general ledger only the ones that affect the checkbook. The appearance is like a ledger.
Some accounting programs put up special windows that look like a check  and the user enters
some of the data there and the account splits elsewhere in the window. Functionally it is
the same. Gnucash does assume some basic knowledge of double entry accounting and so is not
quite so friendly as some other programs.

Dale Alsapch