Trouble changing style

[Guest]

Using Word 2002 in XP professional.

Suddenly I am having trouble changing the style assigned to a line or text:
Following a line formatted as "Heading 3", when I press "enter" to start a
new line, the new line is still formatted as Heading 3! Every attempt I
make to change it to "normal" fails.

If I type some text into the new line, it is formatted as a "heading 3" and
if I select this text and try to change it to "normal" it will not change.

How do I get out of this dilemma? I closed the document and reopened it but
the problem remains. It is a very long document if that is a factor.

Jeff

 

[Terry Farrell]

All styles have a 'Style for following paragraph' setting. Have you checked
to make sure that it hasn't inadvertently set itself to follow with Heading
3 Style? Also, are you ending you Heading 3 with a paragraph return and not
a line feed?

Are you using the DocMap?

 

[Guest]

Not using DocMap.

The problem occurs in a section of text which I pasted into the document. It
consisted of a list of headings styled as Heading 3 that I was planning to
fill in with material later. I think that caused that entire section to be
styled as a continuous Heading 3 region and maybe that is why it will not
permit me to interpose "normal" lines within that area. I think I will just
redo that section without pasting it.

Jeff

 

[Terry Farrell]

I suggest using PasteSpecial as plain text and then you can apply your
styles.

Terry

 

[Kathryn]

I'd look at the formatting... I would bet that you have manual line
breaks... instead of paragraph marks to start the text on the next line.
If that's what happening -- you'll need to change all those manual line
breaks to Paragraphs.... (you can use search & replace to do that).

 

[Guest]

Thank you both.

What do Paragraph marks and manual line breaks look like? I know one looks
like a reversed P. Is that a paragraph mark or a line mark and what does
the other look like?

Thanks.

Jeff

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

See http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Formatting/NonPrintChars.htm for a complete
rundown.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
http://word.mvps.org