Dull Word Question: help very appreciated!

[GrumpyMcGrumpFace]

Hi, I'm trying to do a word count for a section (rather than a whole document). I see many pages which tell me how easy it is to do it with a macro... but they've lost me already there! I am vvvvv stupid at this kind of thing.

If anyone could tell me what to do in words of one syllable (or possibly fewer...) I'd be ever so ever so grateful!

TIA

I'm not very techy. I'd copy and paste it into a new document and do the word count on that.

Count the words as you type

When you type in a document, Word automatically counts the number of pages and words in your document and displays them on the status bar at the bottom of the workspace.

Word count button

If you don't see the word count in the status bar, right-click the status bar, then and click Word Count.

Count the words in a selection or selections

You can count the number of words in a selection or selections, rather than all of the words in a document. The selections don't need to be next to each other for you to count them.

Select the text that you want to count.

The status bar displays the number of words in the selection. For example, 100/1440 means that the selection accounts for 100 words of the total number of words in the document, 1,440.

TIP: To select blocks of text that aren't next to each other, select the first section, and then hold down CTRL and select additional sections.

Count the words in a text box

Select the text in the text box.

The status bar displays the number of words in the text box. For example, 100/1440 means that the text box contains 100 words of the total number of words in the document, 1,440.

According to this, you select the words in the part of the document you want to count, then choose Review --> Word Count.

Just highlight the text you want to count and then click word count, should work I think?

ah yes, it's just a bit of a PITA selecting it all each time - the section is quite a big thing in itself - so I was hoping there was a clever way to not have to scroll through it all every bloody time!! Thanks all

... I was hoping there was a clever way to not have to scroll through it all every bloody time!!

1. Click in the margin of the document at the start of the section you want to word count. This will select the line.

1. Holding the shift key down click in the margin at the end of the section and read the word count at the bottom left of the screen.