non-SubaGuru

Excellent site!! Hopefully, someone can help me on my a situation I have with a 99 Legacy coil. 2.2 motor. 89K. A/T New plugs. The car had a miss and stutter and a check engine light code that AutoZone scanned and coded as a bad "cat". Rev th motor gets you a flashing ch light. Was able to determine that coil has NO fire for #1 plug. 2,3,4 fire nicely. Did the usual swapping of coil, wires with no change. The more I played with the coil/wire swap the worse it got. Went from an occasional miss to total loss of #1 fire. The lady I am doing the work for isn't rich and fears that the dealer will just start throwing expensive parts at it. Any suggestions on where I should start in finding the demons? Appreciate any help. Feel free to e-mail me in order to quicken solution. Vehicle is mail delivery and can't sit idle. Thanks!! Dave