Elements just before/after the current one

  Hello!

  I have a problem, as you can guess. I am struggling to find the element
  that is just before, and the element just after the current one.

  What i am doing now for the element after the current one is :
     following-sibling::*[position() = 1]
  And this seems to work. But for the element just before, i tried
     following-sibling::*[last()]
  but this gives me the first (topmost) item instead of the last !
  So i debugged with :

        <xsl:variable name="prevcount">
                <xsl:value-of select="count(preceding-sibling::*)" />
        </xsl:variable>
        <xsl:for-each select="preceding-sibling::*">
                <xsl:element name="before">     
                        <xsl:value-of select="."/> <!-- or name() -->
                        <xsl:value-of select="position()"/>
                        <xsl:if test="position() = $prevcount">
                                selected
                        </xsl:if>
                </xsl:element>
        </xsl:for-each>

  And the "selected" text appears right next to the good element.
  Then i tried the following to sum it up :

        <xsl:variable name="prevcount">
                <xsl:value-of select="count(preceding-sibling::*)" />
        </xsl:variable>
        <xsl:value-of select="preceding-sibling::*[position() = $prevcount]" />

  But again, it give me the content of the first (topmost) node !!
  What am i doing wrong ?! Is there a simpler way to get these "special" items ?

  Any help would be greatly appreciated !
  Nicolas