MYSQL - to coding a PHP query

I'm just learning MYSQL / PHP. I'm having trouble with a query, it's working in myphpadmin:

select `email`, count(*) as count
from `table`
where `date` = "open"
group by `email`
order by `email`

I can't get it to work if I either write the mysql_query myself or use the php myphpadmin generates:

$sql = "select `email`, count(*) as count\
    . "from `table`\n"
    . "where `date` = \"open\"\n"
    . "group by `email`\n"
    . "order by `email`\n"
    . "";

The purpose is to query a three column table of EMAIL, DATE, EVENT - where EVENT could be "open" or "bounce" and count the number of times a person opened an email.

Here's the rest of the file (I realize I should be using msqli, that's next on my list to figure out....):

<?php


$db_host = '123';
$db_user = '123';
$db_pwd = '123';

$database = '';
$table = 'test';

if (!mysql_connect($db_host, $db_user, $db_pwd))
    die("Can't connect to database");

if (!mysql_select_db($database))
    die("Can't select database");



sql = "select `email`, count(*) as count\n"
    . "from `table`\n"
    . "where `date` = \"open\"\n"
    . "group by `email`\n"
    . "order by `email`\n"
    . "";



// sending query
$result = mysql_query($sql);
if (!$result) {
    die("Query to show fields from table failed 2");
}



echo "<table border='1'>
<tr>
<th>email</th>
<th>event</th>
<th>date</th>

</tr>";

while($row = mysql_fetch_array($result))
  {
  echo "<tr>";
  echo "<td>" . $row['Email'] . "</td>";
  echo "<td>" . $row['event'] . "</td>";
  echo "<td>" . $row['date'] . "</td>";
   }

echo "</table>\n";




mysql_free_result($result);
?>

I just get the "Query to show fields from table failed 2" back - the query didn't work

The '\n' in your query - was generated by myphpadmin (when I use the "generate php code" feature

I have a connection to the database, I just changed the value assigned to those variable so I wouldn't post them

I have the "$" in the $sql var in my file, just didn't get it copied over here.

So,

When I replace this query with a simple one, it works fine, but when I try the more complected query, no luck. I assume it has to do with converting the mysql WHERE date = "open" into proper (escaped?) php....

I'm not sure what the procedure is when I sorta found my own problem = The biggest issue (of several). When I used the "generate PHP code" feature on myphpadmin it didn't keep the capital "E" in Email from the name of the column in the table...