Fantastic - I only needed to modify your code a tiny bit to get the job
done precisely
as I needed -- very grateful to you Tom!

One ? If I may...

The macro failed at the Shell command line.
I am having trouble opening .txt files with the Shell command.

Should it be:

Shell ( C:\Windows\Notepad.exe C:\testfile.txt) , 0

or

Shell "C:\testfile.txt", 0

I'm using xlvba 2003

Thanks again,

Stuart