My friend Mike has a wider knowledge of auto mechanics than I do and I asked if he'd give me a hand to solve this problem. He said yes and off we went.
We checked for fuel. Sniff, sniff....yep, she's getting fuel alright. Next was the spark....no spark. So off came the distributor cap.
He took it all apart and isolated the ignition coil from the main body of the distributor unit (this is something I wasn't clear on when I took the distributor assembly off myself: where was the igntion coil? For anyone looking to replace the ignition coil, it's mounted into the bottom part of the distributor assembly (on this model, which is 1990 4-cyclinder); just loosen the screws to remove).
Mike wasn't 100% sure it was the igntion coil, but the reading he got when he checked it with the meter was very low (neither of us were quite sure how to properly use the ohm-volt-meter gadget I had bought).
Subsequently, I picked up a new coil and we installed it. Mike unscrewed one of the spark plugs to check for a spark. I turned the key and it fired right up on three cylinders!
Let me tell you, it was one of the sweetest sounds a guy could ever imagine!
Now the only problems are (1) no heat, which I suspect is a faulty thermostat and (2) ruptured brake line (which I can fix).

Thanks for all your support in this, I really appreciate it.

-Mike