Also let me post some code snippetts that I have:

Sub AMS360_Online_DBExtraction()

Dim myOLApp As New Outlook.Application
Dim myOLItem As Outlook.MailItem
Dim txtToAddress As String
Dim txtOrderNumber As String
Dim txtAgency As String
Dim txtQID As String

txtToAddress = InputBox("Please insert in a To: email address", "To:")
txtOrderNumber = InputBox("Please insert in an order number.", "Order Number")
txtQID = InputBox("Please insert in the agency id.", "Agency QID")
txtAgency = InputBox("Please insert in the agency name.", "Agency Name")

Set myOLItem = myOLApp.CreateItemFromTemplate("U:\Outlook
Templates\360_DBExtraction.oft")

With myOLItem
.SentOnBehalfOfName = "CLL - AFW/AMS 360 Support"
.To = Trim(txtToAddress)
.BCC = "CLL - AFW-Online Data Center"
.Subject = "RE: AMS360 Backup Completed | " & Trim(txtOrderNumber) & " | " &
Trim(txtAgency) & " | " & Trim(txtQID) & " | AMS360 Backup"

End With

myOLItem.Display

End Sub

I considered doing everything through the .HTMLBody method, but the HTML
code is essentially word "trash" code and I didn't want to have to clean it
all up if need be.  What I would really like to do is define 4 ro so fields
as variables in the oft file that can be set via an input box variable upon
launch of the code...

I am not sure if that helps narrow it down somewhat, but hopefully it should.

I've done this by using placeholders in the HTML where the data from the InputBox result should go. For example, put %Field1% where you want one bit of data to appear, then use something like:

   htmlText = Replace(htmlText, "%Field1%", "New Text")
   myMessage.HTMLBody = htmlText

I am assuming like this:

Set itm = Application.CreateItemFromTemplate("C:\myfile.oft")
itm.HTMLBody = Replace(itm.HTMLBody, "%name%", "customer_name")

I found it in an old forum post of yours off of lockergnome, is that correct?