Excel 2003 SP3 - Plus all post hot fixes

When I am in explorer and click an excel file - excel opens - when I click
on the next file it opens in the same excel, but on task bar it shows I have
2 excel files opened. But it will not let me look at files side by side

I actual want it to open 2 or more copies of excel so that I can view data
side by side. This is default behavior on my system for Word - every time I
click a word doc it opens a copy of word for each file.



I turned on ToolsOptionsGeneral "Ignore other applications" this opens
different copies of excel but not the files I click on. Excel opens blank.

Tools - Options - View - Windows in Taskbar. this doesn't help either

I don't like the Compare side by side option under Window.

Thanks