As to learning VBA: sorry for my limited input as I only have occasional small chunks of time nowabouts. You know, the way I originally learned everything about computers was with a guru at my side - a coworker, professor, fellow student, neighbor, member of a user group. Ultimately my competency was sufficient that I could do basically what I wanted, and could *then* be able to live with getting small chunks of info from the googling or forums - e.g. fixing a single line of code. But I have to confess, I HAD to have an expert in order to get cranking on areas I didn't know, whether that was Assembler language, VBA, spreadsheets or databases.

The alternative to that is "Teach Yourself" books. The "in 14 days" or "in 30 days" ones work extremely well for some. That's how I learned Access. OTOH for Foxpro I had a guy that I asked 120 questions per day.

My stance is to invest the time in order to get an excellent result, though I know the world is not always accommodating in that regard.

Here's something else I have been required to do to use code effectively: step through the code with F8 and shift-F8. Watch what happens on each and every executed line. Use the debug window to confirm assignments. I can't give you a full tutorial on this process but urge you to consider books, or better yet, gurus in the room or on the phone, that can develop this skill. That will, I believe, achieve 98% of what you ever want to do in programming.

You can get there in a month of "teach yourself" work, most likely. Or in a day if you have full time real-time access to a guru. Or take a course. That's my best advice.