avs starts automatically

whenever i open a winamp file the avs comes on automatically to whatever plugin i had last selected. this is very annoying, as it comes on in fullscreen when i'm right in the middle of somthing and i have to press escape to exit the avs. i cannot find a way to stop this, does anyone know how to turn this off?

I assume you're using Winamp 2.x.
Turn off "Auto-execute visualisation plug-in on play" in the Plug-in options.