Saving your work

Lesson:04(Microsoft Word 2007 to 2013)

To save your work in Word 2007, click the round Office button in the top left of your screen. You should see a menu appear:

In Word 2010, click the File tab at the top of Word:

For Word 2013 users, click the File tab as well. Your document will disappear when you click File and you'll see this screen:

Click on Save from the menu on the left. (The area on the right shows you information about the your document.)

When you click Save in Word 2013, the area on the right will change to this:

Under Save As heading in Word 2013, you'll see three options: SkyDrive, Computer, and Add a Place. The first option is SkyDrive. This saves it to servers operated and controlled by Microsoft. This is very useful if you want to work on your Excel document from other locations. For example, you may be working on a document in your office. Saving it to SkyDrive means you'll also be able to open it when you get home from work. When you click the SkyDrive option you'll be able to Sign In, Sign Up, or simply Learn More. We'll be saving to the Computer, though, so click this option. Then click the Browse option:

In all versions of Word, when you click the Save item (or Save then Browse) you'll see a dialogue box appear:

There are three main areas to the Save dialogue box: Where do you want to save your document? What do you want to call it? What type of document do you want to save it as?

We'll take the three areas in turn, starting with "Where do you want to save your document?"

The "Where" is set right at the top. The default location is in the Documents folder on your computer. You can see where this is by clicking the arrow in the top left:

The dropdown menu is a list of locations on your computer. The image above is from Windows 7 and shows that we are in the Libraries folder. If you have Windows Vista, you won't see a Libraries entry. It will say Users. There will then be another one next to Users that has the user name you used when setting up your computer. For example: Users > Kenny > Documents.

Inside the Libraries folder is another one called Documents. We're saving it to this folder. The larger area of the Save As dialogue box shows you the folders that are already in the Documents folder:

You can create folders of your own to hold your work. So click the New Folder button at the top:

You should see a new yellow folder appear in the main area of the Save As dialogue box, with some blue highlighting:

The blue highlighting means that it is ready to be typed over. Type the name My WP Projects. Then press the enter key on your keyboard (or just click away). The folder will then be renamed:

If you get it wrong, click back onto the folder. Now click again, and you should see the same blue highlighting. Or just right click the folder to see a new menu appear. Select Rename from the menu.

Now that you have created a new folder, double click the folder name to move inside of it. Notice the location area at the top:

The name of our folder has been added to the right of Documents, indicating that this new folder is inside of the Documents folder. In other words, there is a folder called Libraries, and inside of that another one called Documents. The folder we have created, the My WP Projects one, is inside of the Documents folder.

File Names

We now need to come up with a name for this particular document that we're saving. If you have a look at the bottom of the Save As dialogue box you'll see two areas: one called File Name, and the other called Save as Type. The File Name area is where you type a name for your document. The Save as Type means which type of document is will be. Microsoft Word documents from 2007 onwards end with the letters docx. Previously, the letters where just doc. If you sent someone a Word document with the ending docx, somebody with version 2003 of the software would not be able to open your file. Simply because previous Office versions don't know how to handle the newer format. The reverse is not true, though: they could send you a file that ended with the letters doc and you would be able to open it up in Word 2007 or Word 2010/13.

Microsoft Word allows you to save documents in a wide range of different formats. Click anywhere inside of the Save as Type area to see a list of the different formats:

The image shows that we have Word 97 - 2003 Document in the Save as Type area. The three letter extension shows .doc. The first one on the list, however, is Word Document .docx, which is the one we want. Make sure this one is selected in your Save As dialogue box.

Now have a look at the File Name area. It should say Doc1.docx. (It might just say Doc1, however, if you haven't enabled file extensions on your computer. If you can't see any file extensions, do the tutorial here on our site: Enable File Extensions.) If your File Name area does not say Doc1, it may just display the first line of text from your document.

If you clicked the Save button now, your file will be called "Doc1" (or whatever you have in the File Name area). That's not a very descriptive name for a document, so we'll change it to something else. To give your document a different name, simply click inside the File Name text box. Delete everything in the text box. Type in a new name, something like Library Letter.

Your Save As dialogue box should now look like the one below. When it does, click the Save button:

You have now saved your work to your hard drive. Word 2007 and Word 2010 users will be returned to the main document area, with the letter displayed. Word 2013 users, however, will stay on the same screen. To get back to your letter, click the white arrow in the white circle top left of your screen:

To prove that your document has indeed been saved, click the round Office button in the top left, or the File tab in Word 2010/13. Select Save As. (Word 2013 users will need to click the Browse button again from the right hand side.) When the Save As dialogue box appears, you should see the name of your file in the big white area:

Click the Cancel button to get rid of the Save As dialogue box.

You can continue to work on a document that has been saved. But if you add more lines to your letter, or make any changes, you need to keep saving your changes on regular basis. You don't have to use Save As any more. You can just click the Office button or the File tab, then click on Save. Or click on the Save icon at the top of the screen, highlighted in the image below. This will update your document.

Word 2007

Word 2010/13

A shortcut for saving your work is to hold down the CTRL key on your keyboard. Keep it held down and then press the letter S.

Remember to save your work on a regular basis. It's not a pleasant experience to have worked on a document for some time only for your computer to break down. When you finally get your computer to work again, if you haven't saved regularly you'll find all that hard work lost forever, with no way to get it back!

OK, now that you know how to save a Microsoft Word document, let's move on. The next section will be about highlighting text.

Your First Letter

Lesson:03(Microsoft Word 2007 to 2013)

Have a look at the blank page on your screen, all that white space. The first thing to notice is the flashing vertical line. This is called the Cursor, or the Insertion Point. Its normal behaviour is to flash on and off.

The cursor is where all the action takes place. Try touching one or two of the letter keys on your computer keyboard and watch what happens. You should see the vertical line, the cursor, move to the right. Your letters will appear to the left of the cursor. In other words, when you tap a letter on your keyboard, the letter will appear where the cursor is. The cursor will move across, ready for the next thing you type.

Before we start typing the letter below, there are three keys on your keyboard that might come in very handy: the Backspace key, the Enter key, and the Shift key.

If you have made a spelling mistake, tap the backspace key to get rid of your unwanted characters. You can also click the Undo icon right at the top of Word. Here's what the Undo feature looks like Word 2007:

In Word 2010 and 2013 it will look like this:

To get a new paragraph, press the Enter key on your keyboard. You cursor will move down one line to the start of the new paragraph.

The Shift key is held down if you want uppercase characters (capital letters). Keep the Shift key held down then press a letter. It will then be a capital letter. You also need to hold the Shift key down to get any of the characters on top of another key. For example, to type an ampersand character ( & ) hold down your Shift key. Keep it held down and press the number 7 (on a UK keyboard).

So, time for your first letter. Type the following onto your new white page. Type it in exactly as it is, spelling mistakes included. (You don't have to make your text bold, though):

 Dear Sir or Madam,

It has come to my attention that our local counsil has decided to close down our one and only libary. While it is true that no new books have been bought for seven years £12.50 was recently raised in a local raffle. This is nearly enough for an entire Delia Smith! Do you not think that your decicion is a little premature?

Yours truly

Mr Irate

 Ok, you can stop typing now. You've finished. So, how did you get on? There's a good chance that you needed to use the backspace key a few times. And finding keys like the pound sign and the exclamation point might have took you more time than you would have liked. But this is usual when you are first starting out: it will come.

Before we get on to those spelling mistakes, let's learn how to save your work.

Microsoft Word 2007 to 2013

Lesson:02:Finding your way around

Have a look at the bottom right of your screen and locate the following area:

Word 2007

Word 20010 and Word 2013

If your screen is too small or too large, you can use the zoom slider to increase or decrease the size of your page. Hold down your left mouse button on the slider. Keep it held down and move it to the left to make your page smaller, and to the right to make it bigger. (You can also click the plus and minus buttons.) The default setting is 100%, and the slider is in the middle.

Just above the slider, you'll see some arrows (not word 2013). The two sets of double arrows allow you to move up or down one page at a time:

Clicking the round button between the two sets of double arrows opens up a shortcut toolbar. This one:

The items on the menu are shortcuts that allow you to browse through various areas of your document. The double arrows then turn blue. So, for example, if you wanted to jump from image to image in your document, you would click the Graphic item on the toolbar, which is the second from the right on the top row in the image above. After the double arrows turn blue, you would click one to move to the next or previous image. Sadly, Word 2013 doesn't have these shortcuts.

Another area worth exploring is just to the left of the zoom slider. This one:

In Word 2013, the icons look like this, and there are only three of them:

These are various page views you can have. The first one, highlighted above, is called Print Layout, and is the default. (Print Layout is the second icon in Word 2013.) Click the other four (or three) to see what they do. To get out of Full Screen, click the Close button in the top right. To get out of Full Screen view in Word 2013 (called Read Mode) click the Print Layout icon again.

Click back on the Print Layout icon, however, when you're finished exploring. We'll make a start.

Microsoft Word 2007 to 2013

 How to Open Microsoft Word

If you're not sure how to open up Microsoft Word, then do the following.

For Windows 8 users, swipe to the right on your Start screen and you should see an icon for Word, as in the following image:

If you have Word 2013, you'll see a screen like the one in the link below:

Microsoft Word 2013 Screen ( 19K )

Most of the time, you'll want to click on Blank Document. Click on that now and you'll see Word 2013 open. It will then look like the screen in the image below (Word 2010 will be be very similar to this one, as well);

Microsoft Word 2013 - Opening Screen ( 15K )

For all others, click your left mouse button once on the Start button in the bottom left of your screen. If you have Windows Vista or Windows 7, the round Start button will look like this:

If you have Windows XP the start button looks like this:

On the Start menu that appears, click your left mouse button on the All Programs item. On the All programs menu, look for Microsoft Office. If you have Office 2007 to Office 2013, you'll see something like this:

If you have an earlier version of Microsoft Word, you'll see something like this:

If you don't see Word 2007, Word 2010 or Word 2013, then you have an earlier version of the software. In which case, your course is here: Word 2000 to 2003 

If you have Word 2007, you should see a screen something like this one:

Microsoft Word 2007 Screen - Study this image - ( 60K )

In Word 2010, you won't see the round Office button in the top left. Instead, you'll have an extra item in the top left - the File tab.

The main area, all that white space, is the page you type on, just like a piece of paper. The area above the white space is called the Ribbon. The Ribbon contains all the toolbars (known as Tabs) that you can use to brighten up the plain white text on your page. The Tabs are called: Home, Insert, Page Layout, References, Mailings, Review and View. (Word 2010 and Word 2013 will also have a File tab, which will be the first item.)

Click each of these in turn to see what items are on each tab. When you have finished exploring, click back on the Home tab. The Home tab contains the items you'll use the most, like font formatting, alignment, cut, copy and paste.

In the next lesson, you'll discover how to find your way around Microsoft Word.