That is only one interpretation of what an attack roll means.
I - and possibly the poster you were replying to - am in the camp that one attack roll is equal to one swing of the sword.
I think this might actually be an AD&D vs 3/4 thing. In 3 and 4, a round is 6 seconds, and the text says something like "an attack roll represents your attempt to strike your target".
In AD&D (specifically 2e) it says:
When making an attack, a character is likely to close with his opponent, circle for an opening, feint here, jab there, block a thrust, leap back, and perhaps finally make a telling blow.
It is important to remember that in AD&D a round lasted about 1 minute, not 6 seconds. That's a very big difference.
[MENTION=882]Chris_Nightwing[/MENTION]'s statement makes perfect sense for AD&D, but [MENTION=162]GnomeWorks[/MENTION]'s interpretation makes more sense for 3E & 4E.
Personally I side with Chris Nightwing, even bearing the 6 seconds in mind.
Any single swing of a sword takes a fraction of a second - even for me, and I only have a handful of hours training with a sword. I don't believe for a moment that an adventurer only makes one strike in 6 seconds at 1st level.
Here's another quote from 2E which I feel sums up combat abstraction (in any version of DND) really well:
Since a round is roughly a minute long, it should be easy for a character to move just about anywhere he wants during the course of the round. After all, Olympic-class sprinters can cover vast amounts of ground in a minute.
However, a character in an AD&D game is not an Olympic sprinter running in a straight light. He is trying to maneuver through a battle without getting killed. He is keeping his eyes open for trouble, avoiding surprise, watching his back, watching the backs of his partners, and looking for a good opening, while simultaneously planning his next move, sometimes through a haze of pain. He may be carrying a load of equipment that slows him down significantly. Because of all these things, the distance a character can move is significantly less than players generally think.
Call me a grognard if you want, but I feel that this interpretation is still valid in the 6 second round. 1 dice roll does not equal one swing of the sword.
For what it's worth, I'm also in favour of defining a combat round as 10 or 12 seconds, rather than 6. Especially if iterative attacks exist in any form. No person should be making 5 shots with a bow in 6 seconds. AD&D's 2 shots per minute is closer to the mark, particularly given that the adventurers are aiming at specific moving targets, not just raining arrows down on an opposing army.