Q I use Excel 97 at home and Excel 95 at the office. I noticed that Excel 95's Center Across Columns button is labelled Merge and Center in Excel 97, and it produces a different effect. Can I still center across a selection in Excel 97?

û Stan Comber

A Clicking Excel 97's Merge and Center button actually performs two operations. It merges the selected cells into a single larger cell, and it horizontally centres the data or text that was in the upper left cell in the merged cell.

You can't return this button to its former functionality, but you can still centre across a selection. Highlight the cells you want to centre, select FormatûCells, click the Alignment tab, select Center Across Selection from the Horizontal drop-down box, and deselect the Merge cells box.