well im not sure if this will go over your head or not...i dont know your skill at circuits but we shall give it a try..
what you need is a multi stage counter. its relatively simple to build. the first stage is a 555 timer circuit. build the osciliation around how ever fast you want your leds to chase, or make it variable so you can adjust it. feed the output of this into a 4017 decade counter. pretty standard chip, but heres some info:
http://www.st.com/stonline/books/pdf/docs/2029.pdf
anyway, i know there is a cheaper decade counter chip out there, just dont remember off the top of my head right now. so, you just get as many counter chips as you need and drive them all off the 555 counter. each led would be tied to an output (0-9) (of course with the right resistor). the leds would be put in sequence and would chase eachother!
hope this helps