I don't mean to get rid of it. I would refer that TOCs were displayed hidden with the show link being used to expand them. I've poked around through the manual and faq, but I haven't found anything about that. I guess another way to word this (which I've also searched for) is to have TOCs displayed collapsed by default, and opened by the viewer when desired. I do not want to use __NOTOC__. I want the TOC to be available, just not taking up the entire page before the article begins.
I could swear I saw this at Wikipedia somewhere, but I can't seem to find it.