I've been using PowerPoint for years and years.
I've always known how to turn the notes pane on and off, but can NOT figure out how to make it appear in 2010. I am editing a file that someone else created and the notes pane is not visible. I've tried PowerPoint help, internet search and forums.

I've spent nearly 30 minutes trying to figure out how to do this simple task that should take 3 seconds What on earth did they do with the command to control the notes pane in Office 2010?

Turns out someone wandered by and said that the notes pane was collapsed on this slide deck. To bring back out, you click on the bottom border of the screen in PowerPoint and drag up and the notes pane magically re-appears!

Can't find anything that tells you how to make it go away or re-appear, so someone had to show me how to do it. So much for years and years of being an 'expert' PowerPoint user!

The Notes Pane can be seen in both Normal and Notes Page views. It also shows up in Presenter View. So you should make sure if your slide is in the above views.