Access denied for root@localhost

[Tom Tilmant]

I have looked at the docs and have try uninstalling and reinstalling mysql
3.22.26a a few times but still get this error 'access denied for
root@loccalhost PASSWD = NO' when I follow the install information of
/usr/bin/mysqladmin -u root passwd 123456.  I am on Red Hat 6.0 and have
seen it installed on a different machine.  I can ping localhost and know
that the address is resolving.  Has someone else had this problem and figure
out the solution?

Tom Tilmant