i dont like the forums because you dont get notifications when some one repalys and you need to refresh the page to see if someone answered you.
You can though, you need to subscribe to a thread and you can see new posts on your control panel. I keep my control panel bookmarked and I have auto subscribe to thread when I make a post in it so I can see and reply to all the threads I have subbed to.
To subscribe to a thread click on "Thread Tools" in the header just under the page number count.