This page provides some tips on working your way about an Excel spread sheet.

• The Excel grid - Cell addresses

When you first start up Excel, here's how it looks.  Across the top are letters, and down the side are numbers.



Just like on a map, you refer to each square, or cell, by its intersection of column and row.

B3 is the cell that's currently active.  You can tell because its address is shown on the upper left corner (A) and the cell itself is outlined with a black border (B) which has a little knob on the lower right corner.
 

• Excel mouse shapes

Here are the four main mouse shapes you'll see in Excel:
 

• The Big Fat White Plus Sign or BFWPS:
 
You can never get into trouble with this symbol.  Whenever you see it, you can select a cell or a group of cells.
 
•  The Copy Tool, or the thin cross:
 
When you see this, you'll copy anything that's selected in whichever direction you drag.  This can be good or bad.  Normally, you only copy formulas.
 
• The Evil Arrow:
 
This will actually move whatever you have selected, sometimes directly on top of something else.  Don't use this most of the time.
 
• The Column- and Row-adjuster

You'll only see this when your mouse is hovering in the gray, title, area of either a row or column.  It widens or narrows a column, or lengthens or shortens a row.