Basic major-mode with specific faces to colour cells in tables

[wilnerthomas]

I intend to highlight the cells in tables.  My reasoning is to define a major 
mode for some class of documents, a few faces, and fontification rules that 
finds fragments (e.g. tables) one would want colored and apply those faces.  
When the file is loaded again, the colours would persist  and the table cells 
coloured.

How would a basic major-mode with specific faces that would colour cells in a 
table look like?