Hi Rich!
Thank you so much for your excellent hints.
'Extracting' the binaries of setterm is a good idea, but seems to 'intervent' to much the TC-system (I can't explain it better, but that's a gut feeling).
I ever wondered where the variables RED, GREEN, etc. are defined in TC. Now I know that this is done in /etc/init.s/tc-functions (maybe I should analize the TC-system better).
To change the color of the foreground with i.e. 'echo $RED' helps me a lot. Unfortunately TC doesn't define variables for the background (i.e. "BGRED=$(echo -e '\033[1;41m')"). But that's what I could add and automate with a script.
Thanks for guiding me the right way.
Regards deetee