Tables appear joined but not recognised as one

[viv]

User created a series of tables in Word 2002, same no. of
columns, same size cells even. She has removed all text
in between tables so they would join. They LOOK joined
(except for a dark line between the different tables).
But they are NOT joined: the table handle appears at
start of each table; the header row is not appearing in
joined tables, can't be sorted, etc etc. It has me
flaberghasted. H E L P ! ! ! (its 16 pages & I don't
want to retype it). thanx

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

Click on the Show/Hide ¶ button and you will probably see a ¶ between the
tables that is formatted as hidden. If you select it and delete it, the
tables will join.

Never trust a user.

--
Please post any further questions or followup to the newsgroups for the
benefit of others who may be interested. Unsolicited questions forwarded
directly to me will only be answered on a paid consulting basis.

Hope this helps
Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[Viv]

Thanks Doug but that's not the answer. We always have
show/hide turned on. There is NOTHING between the tables
except a THICK black line that has nothing to do with
borders!!!! - a big XP mystery, to be sure.

Viv

 

[VIV - got the answer!]

GOT THE ANSWER. Unbeknownst to the user, when she
created the different tables, Word was assigning a
different "Table AutoFormat" to the tables. One table
was "Table Grid", the next "Table Normal". THAT's what
prevented them from joining. As soon as I selected the
same format, they joined.

 

[Suzanne S. Barnhill]

How incredibly annoying! I'll add that to my arsenal of troubleshooting
tips. Other things that can keep them from joining are (a) having several
rows set as heading rows (I *think*, though this may be irrelevant), and (b)
having the text wrapping on one or both of the tables set to Around instead
of None.