background shows through table cells - html

Question

I'm trying to create a table with a decorative border with the content in the middle. So I've created a 3x3 table with images in all the outer cells and content in the middle cell. The code looks like this:
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0" width="60%">
<tr>
<td style="background:url(box_topleft.png);background-repeat:no-repeat transparent;width: 45px; height: 125px"></td>
<td style="background:url(box_topmiddle.png);repeat-x; height: 125px"></td>
<td style="background:url(box_topright.png);background-repeat:no-repeat transparent;width: 45px; height: 125px"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-image:url(box_middleleft.png);background-repeat:repeat-y;width: 45px;"></td>
<td style="background-color:white">text</td>
<td style="background-image:url(box_middleright.png);background-repeat:repeat-y;width: 45px;"></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background:url(box_bottomleft.png);background-repeat:no-repeat transparent;width: 45px; height: 125px"></td>
<td style="background:url(box_bottommiddle.png);repeat-x; height: 125px"></td>
<td style="background:url(box_bottomright.png);background-repeat:no-repeat transparent;width: 45px; height: 125px"></td>
</tr>
</table>
Everything lines up and looks great on a white body background. But when there is another color background or a background image for the body, the background color peeks between the cells.
A simpler example, given a blue body background, the following example should just be a white rectangle:
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0" width="60%">
<tr>
<td style="background-color:blue; width:10px; height:100px"></td>
<td style="background-color:blue; height: 100px">text</td>
<td style="background-color:blue; width:10px; height:100px"></td>
</tr>
</table>
But the browser shows blue lines between the TD.
This happens in Chrome, partially in Firefox and not at all in IE. The cell padding and spacing is already zero, so I don't know why there's any background visible between the cells in Chrome. Is there anything else I need to do?
I've also added the following without success:
table {
border-collapse: collapse;
}
table, th, td {
border: 0px;
}
Thanks. Any help appreciated.