.htaccess ensure www redirect incorrect - apache

Question

I am trying to ensure that urls always have www in front of them for canonicalization reasons.
Unfortunately when I put the following url in:
http://website.net/handbags/1/12/this-is-some-text
It redirects me here:
http://www.website.net/?controller=handbags&path=1/12/this-is-some-text
I would like to add it works fine when using:
http://www.website.net/handbags/1/12/this-is-some-text
I want it to redirect me here...
http://www.website.net/handbags/1/12/this-is-some-text
I'm not sure what could be causing this error. Here is my .htaccess file:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine on
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
# CORE REDIRECT
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z]*)/?(.*)?$ index.php?controller=$1&path=$2 [NC,L]
# ENSURE WWW
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\. [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^([^.]+\.[a-z]{2,6})$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.%1/$1 [R=301,L]
</IfModule>

Answer 1

<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine on
RewriteBase /
# ENSURE WWW
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\. [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^([^.]+\.[a-z]{7})$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.%1/$1 [R=301,L]
# CORE REDIRECT
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z]*)/?(.*)?$ index.php?controller=$1&path=$2 [NC,L]
</IfModule>
You can do what I've done above; however, it's just going to redirect to http://www.website.net/handbags/1/12/this-is-some-text and then it's immediately going to hit the "CORE REDIRECT" rule and send you to http://www.website.net/?controller=handbags&path=1/12/this-is-some-text.
Is there a reason you don't want it to redirect to "?controller=handbags" when they go to www?
UPDATE
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine on
RewriteBase /
# ENSURE WWW
Rewritecond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www\.website\.net
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.website.net/$1 [R=301,L]
# CORE REDIRECT
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^([a-zA-Z]*)/?(.*)?$ index.php?controller=$1&path=$2 [NC,L]
</IfModule>

Answer 2

Whenever your # CORE REDIRECT matches, the other rules are not even checked, as the core redirect rule has the Lflag set. That ones tells Apache to stop trying other rules. Remove that flag or change the rule. ;)