Help connecting two ports and ssh_channel_open_forward (or ssh_channel_open_reverse_forward?)

[Jens Winslow <jenswinslow4@xxxxxxxxx>]

I wish to connect two ports securely through SSH, so that I can connect a
socket with a secure transmission.

I have an Echoing Server socket on port 2000 of my Windows machine running
SSH server.
I have a Client Socket that tries to connect to port 2000 and test
connection by sending (and receiving back data).
*This works fine without SSH*.

Now I want to connect port 2000 on my SSH serve machine running echoing
socket server to port 2001 in my client socket machine, then have my client
socket connect to 2001, but effectively connect to 2000 through SSH.

Something like this

EchoClientSocket --P2001 IP127.0.0.1 ==SSH==> P2000
IP192.168.1.109--->EchoSocketServer


   - As per tutorial:
   If I use authenticated session to get channel, and call
   ssh_channel_open_forward(channel, "192.168.1.109", 2000, "127.0.0.1",
   2001)
   I get no errors (or reversing combinations of IPs and ports, since it is
   unclear to me what is which machine and ports being connected)
   *However, connecting to port 2001 does not make socket server on port
   2000 see connection, and sending data from socket on 2001 never shows up on
   2000, nor does a reply come back.*

- As per tutorial
   ssh_channel_open_reverse_forward
   ssh_channel_accept_forward
   fails with error on ssh_channel_accept_forward

   - Trying to connect and set up tunnel with putty seems to work (no
   error) - but again, there seem to be no connection between ports and I fail
   to connect to port 2001

   - If I run ssh -L command on 127.0.0.1, and provide my admin password,
   ssh -L 2001:127.0.0.1:2000 127.0.0.1
   I get a connection between port 2001 and 2000 after I provide my admin
   password.

*At this point my socket and client works *Client--Port 2001--==SSH==--Port
   2000----Echo Socket Server


So I have several questions

   1. The documentation for ssh_channel_listen_forward,
   ssh_channel_open_reverse_forward say "This function does not bind the local
   port and does not automatically forward the content of a socket to the
   channel. You still have to use channel_read and channel_write for this. "
      1. *If they do not make a connection, what is the purpose of these
      commands?*
      2. *Why would I want to use them?*
      3. *How do I use the channel read and write to bind ports and
      sockets?*

      2.
*What is the best/ correect way to use libssh to connect 2 ports with a
   secure connection? *Port N on IP ABC <===SSH===> Port M on IP XYZ
      1.

*How can I achieve "ssh -L 2001:127.0.0.1:2000 <http://127.0.0.1:2000>
      127.0.0.1" **programatically*

      3.

*Am I supposed to use forwarding or reverse forwarding? *
   4. *Any suggested links and references?*
   I am obviously not having much luck connecting two ports based on
   tutorial (I did manage to connect a channel, make a pseudo shell  and
   read/write commands).

In advance, thanks for any help and suggestions.
My eternal gratitude for a code example achieving a secure connection
between two ports.

Jens Winslow