The conition should be just:

Formula Is =$A$1=""
__________________________________________________ ______________________

"johnston" wrote in message
...
I'd appreciate help understanding why an apparently simple conditional
formatting is not working as expected. A group of rows was formatted at
one
time but responded erratically to changes in cell entries. What I did
was -
*open a new workbook,
*select rows 1-10
*in the Conditional Format menu, choose "Formula is"
*enter =if($A$1="",TRUE, FALSE)
*choose fill color, for ex. red
*hit the ENTER key
*rows 1-10 turned red, as expected.

Here's the problem. When I typed into cell A1 a few random letters, some
of
the rows returned to the default color of white. Why not all? Even more
confusing, if I minimize and expand the window, the formatting of all rows
is
now correct.