Delete extra returns following end notes

[Guest]

After end notes (in a document I'm editing that was created by someone else)
I have about 50 extra returns, resulting in a whole blank page in my
document. When I try to delete them, either as a group or singly, I get an
error message saying this is not an allowable action for end notes.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

It sounds to me as if Enter has been pressed a lot of times in the creation
of one or more notes. It is usually possible to delete such empty paragraphs
one way or another. If Delete doesn't work, try Backspace. And try placing
the insertion point in different places. Sometimes you can use Delete at the
end of the last text paragraph even when selecting an empty paragraph and
pressing Delete won't work.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

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[Guest]

As I said, I don't know how these returns all came to be here, as someone who
is not a veteran Word user created the file.

I'm a semi-veteran, and I'm very frustrated. I was able to delete a couple
of the extra ones, sometimes with backspace, sometimes with highlight/delete,
and sometimes with the delete key, and also trying, as you said, putting the
cursor in different places. But I seem to be stuck with about 45 of them. The
exact wording I get when I try to delete them by any means is, "This is not a
valid action for end notes." No alternatives suggested. I've never seen this
message before and I've actually worked a lot with end notes. I tried
converting them to footnotes, and it does seem as if the last one is the
problem (can't delete the returns when it's a footnote, either--same error
message) and I also can't find the footnote reference in the text. The person
who created the file is no help at all.

 

[Guest]

As I said, I don't know how these returns all came to be here, as someone who
is not a veteran Word user created the file.

I'm a semi-veteran, and I'm very frustrated. I was able to delete a couple
of the extra ones, sometimes with backspace, sometimes with highlight/delete,
and sometimes with the delete key, and also trying, as you said, putting the
cursor in different places. But I seem to be stuck with about 45 of them. The
exact wording I get when I try to delete them by any means is, "This is not a
valid action for end notes." No alternatives suggested. I've never seen this
message before and I've actually worked a lot with end notes. I tried
converting them to footnotes, and it does seem as if the last one is the
problem (can't delete the returns when it's a footnote, either--same error
message) and I also can't find the footnote reference in the text. The person
who created the file is no help at all.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

I'm familiar with the error message (though I've never encountered quite so
many empty paragraphs). I have never been unable to get rid of them
eventually, though. You might want to treat the document as corrupt; see
http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/AppErrors/CorruptDoc.htm. You might also want to
look for evidence that it was originally created in WordPerfect. I've seen
some very odd things going on with footnotes in documents converted from WP.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.