I then found out that AppleWorks doesn't support scrolling mice but what the hey, it scrolls in every other app.
Appleworks is an older
carbon (procedural) code base and support for such things as scroll wheels/balls has to be specifically written into the code. The Appleworks code preceded those devices and therefore does not support them.
Many, perhaps most,
carbon apps on OS X have been modified to provide support at least for vertical scrolling if not vertical and horizontal. Virtually all Apple's OS X apps have been written using the
Cocoa (object oriented) programming environment so that when the
Cocoa libraries are updated to support new technologies such as horizontal and vertical scrolling, all
Cocoa apps automatically
inherit the added functionality.
One more reason for you to begin and/or complete the migration from Appleworks to iWork or other
Cocoa applications. (FYI NeoOffice is a
Java application (another object oriented environment) but it is in a
Cocoa wrapper so it too inherits many, if not all, of the features in the cocoa environment.