In the BIOS you should be able to set up wake on mouse or wake on keyboard- or even at a certain time - my computer is set to wake up at 7:30 am every day.

But unless you are familiar with the Bios and settings there I would have someone that knows about it to help you set it up.

If you have a new laptop with Vista?
maybe something in the advanced settings in the control panel mouse or power control options will work to set wake up???