Fading canvas

Hello,

i have made a setup with a canvas and several rawr images as buttons in the canvas.
i would like another button that when i click that one the other buttons hide. and when i click it again they appear again. thats the simple setup.

the IMO better looking setup would be that they fade away. and fade in again.
i have tried some scripts that have been posted here but i can't seem to figure out what is going wrong.
nothing works and i have no knowledge of scripting what so ever.

pls help me in both ways so i can test them and post here what i have done and if it worked or not.
thank you very much in advance!!!!

Nick.