Eliminating the white cross

[Fool]

All of a sudden my Excel program will not give me the
arrow cursor but only a white cross which will not allow
me to edit or delete anything but only produces shaded
areas. I have no idea how this started and need to know
how to get back the arrow cursor. Have tried everything,
including reinstalling the program, but the problem
continues.

 

[Bernard Liengme]

Hi,
Tap the F8 key - you are in Extend mode. If you tap F* and watch the status
bar you will see EXT come and go - just like tapping Caps Lock cycles CAPS
on/off.
Bernard

 

[Stranded]

Help! I have experienced the same problem that Fool had (has), and for
long periods of time have been unable to use my mouse in Excel.
Bernard Liengme, your response does not address my problem. (Did it
solve yours, Fool?)

Whether I open a new or old workbook, I am able to use Excel as long as
I don't click on a cell using my mouse. What frequently happens is
that as soon as I do click on a cell (whether I have clicked on F8 to
put me in extended ("EXT") mode or not!), I have the white cross. No
matter what I do from that point until I reboot, the white cross
doesn't go away -- moving the mouse accomplishes nothing except
extending the cells I've selected. Clicking again doesn't do anything,
and with the permanent white cross, I have no access to any toolbars,
whether by mouse or keyboard. When I close the probram via
CTL-ALT-DEL, the problem recurs upon opening Excel again. Only
rebooting seems to solve the problem (temporarily).

Bernard Liengme, my understanding is: A user is always able to extend
selected cells by clicking on the bottom right corner of
bottom-right-most cell. This, however, does not put a user in extend
("EXT") mode. Hitting F8 does put a user in extend mode, the purpose
of which, I find, is to enable one to extend a selection using keyboard
arrow keys.