Fading background made simple

I wanted to implement fading background for HTML elements that are changed in the background based on XMLHttpRequest calls made in my AJAX applications, the idea being that the user's attention would shift toward the changed element without the visual cue being too intrusive. As I've had excellent experience with the X library, I started my search there … and found the xAnimation.rgb function that does exactly what I've needed. The following short function changes the element's background from page default (white) to dark yellow and back in a second:

function setFading (e) {
  e.style.backgroundColor = "#FFFFFF";
  if (!e.xa) e.xa = new xAnimation();
  e.xa.rgb(e,"background-color","#EDC226",1000,1,1);
}