Tim,
Back in the olden times there was AutoLISP, Diesel, and ADS for customizing AutoCAD. Both AutoLISP and ADS used DCL to create a GUI (graphical user interface). When Microsoft took over the world, AutoLISP became VisualLISP, ADS became ADSRX (which was later shortened to ARX), and VB became the new kid on the block. Well, AutoCAD and it's users didn't want to throw away years of customization and development so VB graciously gave them MFC (Microsoft Forms Class). ARX, being fully assimilated by the borg, er I mean Microsoft, had direct access to MFC - VisuaLISP, however, stubbornly maintained singularity - thus was forced to compete with the dreaded Visual Basic for Applications(VBA) to be the casual programmers language of choice.
The evil empire, with the dark lord "Darth Va", ah, I mean VB, had almost taken control of the known virtual universe but for a rag tag band of AutoLISPers who started a rebellion. They secretly realized that the evil empire had unwittingly provided a way to control the evil VBA when they made AutoLISP "activex aware". By utilizing the power of the VL application they were able to communicate with VBA, providing it with false information as to the where abouts of their secret base . . .. Well, you get the picture.
So we're using VBA - which has a much more robust GUI - to create really cool dialog boxes - while still doing all the hard work in AutoLISP. This way we're thumbing our nose at Microsoft and clinging to our aging, single purpose language: AutoLISP.
Make any sense?